Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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August 24, 2000 USC investigates alleged misuse of funds ■ Five people who work for USCs Institute of Public Affairs have been suspended indefinitely by Charles Prashaw The Gamecock Five USC employees who work for the Insti tute of Public Affairs have been suspended with ™ ut pay for suspicion of misusing university funds for personal use. The Gamecock has confirmed that one of the suspended employees is Sarah Grayson, who works in the institute’s Office of Research. Grayson, and the four others who have yet to be identified, have been suspended indefinitely. Grayson confirmed late Wednesday night that she was one of the five suspended employees. In an incident report obtained by The Game cock, an unidentified complaintant said “persons unknown have misused University procedures to fraudulently obtain money or goods for personal use.” According to the report the incident is said to have begun Jan. 1,1998. According to university spokesman Jason Sny der, those individuals being investigated range from a middle-management position down to a clerical aide. The institute supports about 60 employees and includes professors, researchers and support staff. However, since the case is open and no formal chaiges have been filed, the names of the five em ployees who are being investigated are not being released. Snyder said USC can’t release the names of the five employees because the university is looking for others who might be involved with the incident. The USC Police Department turned the case over to the State Law Enforcement Division and the SLED office in Columbia has assigned an ex pert white-collar criminal investigator to the case. SLED also has sought the opinions of the 5th Cir cuit Solicitor’s Office to determine whether any laws have been broken. A SLED spokeswoman was reluctant to comment on the case. “SLED as a general rule never divulges infor mation in open cases like the Institute one,” Cather ine Richardson said. However, SLED officials told The Game cock that two boxes filled with two months’ worth of documents related to the investigation are miss ing from the institute. According to Snyder, the case first caught the attention of the USCPD when someone inside the institute formally complained to the university’s administration department. The USCPD incident report lists the complainant as USC and the address Funds see page a2 Sean Raytord The Gamecock Cars head past the Women’s Quad toward Bull Street Garage on Sunday. A new parking lot has been built beside the garage on an area that had previously been green space. Students to decide fate of new parking lot by Charles Prashaw The Gamecock An online poll beginning Friday will de termine what will be done with a new park ing lot behind the Bull Street garage that was built this summer. The poll will determine who will be al lowed to park in the lot, and will be on the £ i student government Web site at www.sg.sc.edu and on The Gamecock’s, wwwgamecock.sc.edu, from Friday until Tues day. One possibility students will be allowed to vote on is a plan to allow only students who live near the parking lot to have spaces. An other one would provide free parking to any body on a first-come first-served basis. An other, favored by Student Body President Jotaka Eaddy, would put meters with two-hour time limits in the lot. According to Biddy, that would make the turnover in the lot higher, which would pro vide more people with parking. Under the parking meter plan, the money generated from g the parking meters would go toward paving the lot. According to Parking Services Direc tor Derrick Huggins, the university felt it best for a group of student leaders to decide if the lot would be free, have pay meters or re quire parking decals. Director of Student Life Jerry Brewer said the university has had the property for years but didn’t do anything with it. But over the years, people have requested that USC turn the area into a parking lot. “It just makes sense to turn it into park ing,” Brewer said. “There’s really nothing else useful USC could do with such a small lot.” The new parking lot is just one of die many changes students will see in the next couple of years, said Huggins. Parking Services has devised a two-phase parking plan, which it hopes to implement by 2001. The first phase would provide more shuttle bus trans portation from perimeter parking and would also expand perimeter parking. The second phase would make the central parts of campus even more pedestrian-friendly. “In the next two years, students will have a real campus they can walk around,” Huggins said. “It’s not going to be easy, but students are going to have to get out of the frame of mind that they can just drive everywhere they want to go.” A construction crew filled in the for merly grassy lot with gravel at a cost of near ly $30,000, according to Huggins. The lot was graveled to provide the university with an ad ditional 90 parking spaces. The university desk can be reached at gamecockudesk@hotmail. com. Amy Goulding The Gamecock The recently completed parldng lot at Bull and Blossom streets. Former dean convicted of embezzlement by Brandon Larrabee The Gamecock CHRISTIANSBURG, Va. —For mer Engineering Dean Craig Rogers has been convicted of embezzling money during his previous job at Virginia Tech a week after he resigned his fac ulty position at USC. Montgomery County Circuit Judge Ray Grubbs sentenced Rogers to two concurrent three-year sentences, which Grubbs suspended. Rogers was placed on probation and ordered to pay resti tution. He had faced as much as 10 years in prison. Rogers was convicted of larceny un der false pretenses for transactions dur ing his term as director Virginia Tech's Center of Intelligent Material Systems and Structures. The transactions, in volving an undetermined amount of money, took place between April 1993 and August 1996. Rogers also used $586 in state mon ey to travel to a Virginia Tech basket ball game in Dallas while attending a conference in Denver. Craig Rogers won't face Jail time for Illegal transactions that took place while he was an administrator at Virginia Tech. Grubbs said because he thought Rogers' actions were intentional, he had no choice but to convict the former dean. Rogers had maintained his actions were inadvertent. Defense attorney Jimmy TUrk asked Grubbs to take the charges under ad visement while Rogers served his pro bation. He highlighted Rogers' pre sentence record, including a letter of recommendation from Gov. Jim Hodges. “I'm not asking for you to do any thing out of the ordinary,'” Turk told Montgomery County Circuit Judge Ray Grubbs. "T'm asking you to do what's fair."’ Rogers see page a2 Election 2000 Bush camp stays optimistic despite Gore's resurgence by John Huiett The Gamecock Polls show Democratic presidential hopeful A1 Gore enjoying a lead over Republican nominee Texas Gov. George W. Bush following Gore’s nomination acceptance speech last week at the De mocratic National Convention, but the Bush camp has said there is no need for concern. past weekend, Reno says she two polls, one won’t launch conducted by Gore probe The Washington p .a Post with ABC PAGE A8 News, and an other by CBS News with The New York Times, give Gore a slight edge over Bush among voters, who said Gore is the one they trust on issues such as the econo my and health care reform. The Washington Post-ABC News poll gives Gore a 50 percent to 45 per cent lead over Bush, while the CBS News- New York Times Times poll gives Gore a one-point advantage, with each candidate receiving a percentage in the mid-40s. Gore’s positive shift in public opinion comes at a time when Bush has had as much as a 15-point lead over the vice president over the past few months. But current polling data isn’t reli able, said Tucker Eskew, senior com munications adviser for the Bush cam paign in Austin, Texas. Eskew said polls taken over a weekend, especially the weekend following the most positive press Gore has received during the cam paign so far, don’t accurately represent the views of voters. “Wfe don’t put much stock in minute to-minute polls,” Eskew said. The Post-ABC News poll, which interviewed nearly 900 registered vot ers, puts Gore ahead of Bush with women with a majority vote of 56 percent. Bush still commands the lead with men with 51 percent. The CBS News-Times poll puts Gore and Bush almost neck and neck, but reveals that Gore has a nearly 30-point gain among voters who said he was more specific in talking about policy issues. Bush suffered a three-point decline, though, down to 50 percent. Poll see page A2 Weather Inside Datebook Online Poll Today 92 71 Friday 91 ,69 iUSC set to kick off the 2000 foot ball season Page B1 Thursday • Classes begin • Welcome Week continues • Greek recruitment continues What should be done with the new parking lot beside Bull St. garage? Vote at www.gamecock.sc.edu. Results will be^>ublished next Friday.