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Wildcat theft silenced newspaper and alleged drugged victim

By Steven Kwan

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Published: Friday, November 13, 2009

Updated: Friday, November 13, 2009

So the University of Arizona Police Department closed the case on the theft of 10,000 copies of the Arizona Daily Wildcat, and the Greek Standards Board ruled in favor of Phi Kappa Psi last week.

Sadly, amid the frothing furor, spewing bile and cries of conspiracy, many readers and the Daily Wildcat have forgotten the likely cause of the theft.

A female student told UAPD she believes someone at a Phi Kappa Psi party drugged her with GHB, a drug often used in sexual assaults.

Let that sink in for a moment.

An unidentified man at the fraternity’s Sept. 27 party gave the woman a drink that caused her to experience symptoms similar to being drugged with GHB.

The woman didn’t report being sexually assaulted, but she also wasn’t examined for signs of it either.

Now consider the Oct. 8 Police Beat report: “She also told police that she had attempted to contact the fraternity president and had left several messages at the fraternity, but had received no replies.”

Sound familiar?

“She told officers she was reporting the incident to document the event in the hopes of preventing any future sexual assaults.”

This incident was printed in the Daily Wildcat issue that was stolen.

There are tragic lessons to draw from all of this.

The Daily Wildcat and the UAPD failed in their responsibilities.

The Daily Wildcat failed to adequately follow up on the Police Beat report, mainly because it was caught up in the theft of its papers.

But I won’t go into further details of its failure here because that’s not the main issue. I do, however, invite enterprising journalism students who don’t work at the Daily Wildcat to write in with what should have been done.

UAPD has failed in its duties since it has essentially condoned stealing the newspaper whenever any group or individual doesn’t like what’s published, which is a dangerous precedent to set.

UAPD acted as if the newspaper theft and the possible rape will go away if nothing is said about it — which is what Phi Kappa Psi President Keith Peters has been doing and continues to do.

We’ll never know if what happened to the woman won’t happen again at another Phi Kappa Psi party.

Instead of working with UAPD to be more vigilant and prevent possible rape or proclaiming their innocence, Peters and the rest of the fraternity believed it was better to silence a newspaper and the woman.

I cannot believe that every single Phi Kappa Psi member would condone the use of date rape drugs at their parties. Yet the members’ silence is deafening.

If another woman is drugged at a fraternity party, don’t expect to hear about it from UAPD or to read about it in the Daily Wildcat.

UAPD won’t do anything if its calls are unreturned and its e-mails go unanswered. The UA community won’t know about such incidents since the newspaper can now be stolen without real consequences. Victims of sexual assault will have no voice or refuge in their college publication or their local police.

And that is the most tragic lesson.

— Steven Kwan is a nutritional sciences senior. He can be reached at letters@wildcat.arizona.edu.

Comments

17 comments
nukka
Mon Nov 16 2009 18:58
UAPD cares about one thing: making money. The more revenue they generate, the better. They could care less about a girl getting raped or anything serious actually happening. It is far far more profitable to go around campus during the weekend, and "approach" any college student walking around campus after midnight and initiate a "welfare check," which results in a Minor in Possession. Tucson Police and the UAPD are essentially Nazi's in Police Uniforms, if you don't believe it, read about the legality of red tags.
I'm paying for this?
Mon Nov 16 2009 11:20
To play the angle here that Phi Psi is wrong now because now women won't know to be careful in fraternity houses is almost as ridiculous as the fact you guys STILL have not gotten your panties out of a bunch (It is November 16, that happened between October 8 and 9.....LAME) To write what you guys have written only now to try and seem sympathetic for the women looks really fake. You guys are insincere, uncreative, and unprofessional. My favorite line is the following:

"I cannot believe that every single Phi Kappa Psi member would condone the use of date rape drugs at their parties. Yet the members’ silence is deafening."

How does silence equate to approval of the use of date rape drugs? And all of this is based on the assumption that the young lady was telling the truth, and not just really drunk. I'm tired of tryng to spell out for you guys why this is garbage, but you're probably too low brow for that. Thank goodness we have a police department and a constitutional right to due process and being innocent until proven guilty, and that the Daily Wildcat is not the police, judge, or jury. Steven Kwan you should've kept it real and wrote something you wanted and not what the opinions board told you too, like a female dog.

Matt
Sun Nov 15 2009 02:32
This has been the most whiny set of editorials and news stories I have ever seen. Accusations without a shred of evidence, using the date-rape drug as a scapegoat for the fact that you are pissed about your newspapers being stolen, and accusing a group of people of liking to drug girls?

Now that I think about it, the Editor is setting himself up for success for a career with the NY Times...

Sick of the Greek Life Hierarchy
Sat Nov 14 2009 13:21
"ua greeks donate more hours of community service and money to charity than any other organizations on campus."

Because you have to do that. It's in your bylaws and even part of your club description. It's probably the only reason universities let students pay to have friends (i.e. Join a frat/sorority).

Your name
Sat Nov 14 2009 13:11
lol frats
go suck yo daddys dick
Your name
Sat Nov 14 2009 02:34
get over yourslef and stop writing about this. no one cares anymore except for the paper
Puzzled
Sat Nov 14 2009 01:50
If a village supports an idiot, then does that make the village look like idiots too? It seems both the Wildcat and the Greek system look like idiots.
yicheng
Sat Nov 14 2009 00:12
hey scott, ua greeks donate more hours of community service and money to charity than any other organizations on campus. more greeks graduate than non and have a higher collective gpa. those are your statistics and if you want to verify feel free to do so just google "greek life benefits". thanks for being so brave with not stereotyping ALL greeks just as i'm sure your political correctness doesn't permit you to believe that ALL blacks are killers and ALL mexicans are thieves.
scott
Sat Nov 14 2009 00:06
wildcat, please keep posting articles that make sororities and frats look horrible. I'm not joking, i'm being rather serious. i hate frats, i hate sororities. this comes after a friend of mine died at a frat party, even though they knew she was a minor. i later heard the frat guys claiming they were givin her free booze just to get in her pants. i know that not all frat and not all sorority is bad....but look at how many claims there are weekly about some frat or some sorority did something or other that harmed another person. personally, get rid of them all. make greek life disappear forever. i wonder how many people who join a frat or sorority as a freshman, actually graduate. that would be an interesting statistic to follow through with. please wildcat, keep posting articles that make sororities and frats look bad; it helps support my claim that greek life (while it does have some benefits) is still a waste.
Your name
Fri Nov 13 2009 21:04
this is seriously teetering on a possible villification suit
Guess Who
Fri Nov 13 2009 13:57
The girl was not drugged. And she was not a victim of sexual assault. READ THE POLICE BEAT! There are no reports of her being sexually assaulted or drugged. If she had been drugged, she would have passed out within 20 minutes. This girl somehow managed to party her ass off the entire night and was able to walk home afterward? I mean COME ON. And if she really felt she was in danger then why didn't her friends step in and take her home right away? And also, if she really felt drugged then why didn't she go to hospital right away OR contact the police right away? There are just so many holes in this story and it's hard to believe that people can actually take this seriously.

"I cannot believe that every single Phi Kappa Psi member would condone the use of date rape drugs at their parties."

Really? Last time I checked, every single Phi Kappa Psi member does NOT condone the use of date rape drugs. If you disagree, please provide evidence that supports your claim. If you cannot provide evidence, then your false statement doesn't hold any water. The Daily Wildcat apparently seems to be a huge fan of slander and libel. NO ONE at Phi Psi condones date rape drugs nor does any other fraternity on campus. Keep publishing this bullsh*t and I promise there will be retribution Daily Wildcat.

Your name
Fri Nov 13 2009 12:05
Every Girl at the U of A: That Police Beat was reprinted the next day after the papers were stolen
you
Fri Nov 13 2009 12:03
If you take this seriously go back and read the original police beat. Its a joke
Every Girl at the U of A -
Fri Nov 13 2009 11:27
We have a right to see that original police beat. IN PRINT. Plenty of Frats/Sororitys are named in the Police Beat every month. Never before has someone stolen every single copy over it. Give us that police beat Daily Wildcat!!! Or, perhaps you can get one of your journalist to write a detailed account of date-rape drug sexual encounters, and the physical and pyschological harm that coma state girls experience on the drug? Come on Daily Wildcat.
Your name
Fri Nov 13 2009 11:16
Wow... Forget the fact that the frat boys stole the papers. here are 3 consecutive sentences from the article:
A female student told UAPD she believes someone at a Phi Kappa Psi party drugged her with GHB, a drug often used in sexual assaults.

Let that sink in for a moment.

An unidentified man at the fraternity’s Sept. 27 party gave the woman a drink that caused her to experience symptoms similar to being drugged with GHB.

The author jumped from accusation to guilt w/o zero proof. I can think of multiple other possibilities for why this girl 'felt' drugged. Maybe she had too much to drink, didn't eat dinner, had the flu, or was on medication.

Every Girl at the U of A -
Fri Nov 13 2009 11:05
How about this Daily Wildcat? Since the UAPD and Greek Standards Board decided to allow 10,000 copies of newspapers containing the ONLY evidence that Phi Kappa Psi had anything to do with a potential date-rape drug on September 27th, REPRINT the damn police beat!!! Do YOUR DUTY Daily WIldcat and let the women know at the U of A, that frats can get away with hiding 10,000 newspapers, but cannot hide from the TRUTH!!!!!
Robert
Fri Nov 13 2009 01:22
I'm a student at another university, and my friend just linked me to this article for a good laugh. All I can say to whoever wrote this is: go back to 8th grade and put it in your Xanga, and don't pollute your university's newspaper with this drivel.

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