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TH University of South Carolina MONDAY M ARPW Q 1 OHOQ . Vol.96,No.74 www.dailygamecock.com IVIVJINL/Ml, IVIrAixL/l I Ji, Z.VJUO since 1908 USC students to rally for affirmative action More than 300 travelling to D.C. to protest outside Supreme Court BY KEVIN FELLNER THE GAMECOCK Some USC students are joining thousands from across the nation 0 in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday in a demonstration outside the U.S. Supreme Court as it hears argu ments in a landmark case debating affirmative action admissions poli cies at public universities. Fourth-year sociology student Quinten Dingle has been rallying support for the trip, organizing bus transportation for students in favor of affirmative action. He said that more than 300 USC students are going and that at least six oth er colleges in South Carolina are sending students to the rally. The other colleges include Allen University, Benedict College and Francis Marion University. Thousands of students from hundreds of universities nation wide are expected to participate, according to the rally’s organizer, United for Equality and Affirmative Action Legal Defense Fund. “This is bigger than black and white,” Dingle said. “This is for minorities and women of all sorts, and I saw that no major organiza tion on campus was picking up on this issue. So I just tried to get stu dents interested and got sponsors to help pay for the buses and ex penses.” The rally is planned for 9 a.m. to noon and is expected to coin cide with the court’s hearings on Grutter v. Bollinger and Gratz v. Bollinger, which originated as suits against the University of Michigan’s law school and its un dergraduate program, respec tively. The plaintiffs claim that the university gave spots to less-qual ified minority applicants that should have gone to white appli cants. The court’s ruling is ex pected to specify whether it is con stitutional for public universities to give bonus points to minority applicants to purposely increase the diversity of the student body. Dingle and other affirmative-ac tion supporters say the measure would give more opportunities for qualified minorities to get a col lege education and that university admissions criteria as a whole fa vor wealthy, non-minority stu dents. “If they do away with affirma tive action at the college level, it’s just a stepping stone for schools and offices to become either all black or all-white,” Dingle said. “Everything would just become segregated again.... That’s not the direction that America needs to be going in right now.” Dingle said he thinks USC has a respectable percentage of African-American students. But ♦ RALLY, SEE PAGE 3 USCPD arrests 7 in break-ins PHOTO BY TRISHA SHADWELL/THE GAMECOCK After a series of break-ins on campus this month,police say students should be aware of what they leave in their cars. BY ALLYSON BIRD THE HAHECOCK After a string of automobile break-ins this month, USC police have made seven arrests and put out a warrant for a eighth suspect. Labrian Ramon Williams, 18; David Ryan Q Burrell, 18; Brandon O’Neal Boyles, 17; and Charlie Lorenzo Bates, 17, were arrested, and the police are seeking Franklin Robinson, who is either 17 or 18 years old, according to USC police reports. The other three suspects are ju veniles. These eight suspects could be respon sible for up to seven burglaries, said Lt. Henry Garbade, spokesmari for the USC Police Department. At least four of the arrests were made as a result of students calling to report suspicious activity, Garbade said. “The more eyes we have looking for these folks,” he said, ‘.‘the better the chance they get caught." Garbade said this type of crime is common during the spring. “As the weather gets warmer and it’s not uncomfortable to be out late at night, we’re go ing to see an increase,” he said. But “those ar rests we’ve made seem to have slowed things down a bit.” Between March 1 and March 26, according to USC police reports, 24 automobile break-ins were reported, along with three vehicles stolen and 10 tampered with. Garbade’s advice to students is to keep valu ables out of plain view in their vehicles. Earlier in the month, he said, campus po lice noticed items in many vehicles that were obvious targets. When they called the vehicles’ owners, they found that “some of them were receptive, and some told us it was their stuff and to leave it in the car,” Garbade said. Katie McClendon, Student Government safe ty director, said she was disappointed with the owners’ response. “I didn’t really understand,” the fourth-year pharmacy student said. Checking vehicles for valuables is “not something the police have time to do on a regular basis,” she said. Second-year African-American studies stu dent Erica Whipple was one victim of the break-ins. When her car was broken into on March 14, a CD player and her boyfriend’s track-meet medal were stolen, she said. The juvenile who had robbed her was caught, she said, and everything was returned. ♦ ARRESTS, SEE PAGE 3 ODK honors new members PHOTO BY TRISHA SHADWELl/THE QAMECOCK Third-year English student Kelly Bowen lights a candle at the Omicron Delta Kappa induction ceremony yesterday. 101st Airborne surrounds Shiite holy city in Iraq BY KIMBERLY HEFLING AND CHRIS TOMLINSON THE ASSOCIATED HHESS NEAR NAJAF, IRAQ - The U S. Army encircled the Shiite holy city of Najaf on Sunday and said it killed about 100 paramilitary fighters and captured about 50 Iraqis. The “terror squad members” were killed'Sunday at Najaf and another town in fighting with the 82nd Airborne Division, the Central Command said in a state ment Monday. It did not further identify the “terror squads” or give other details about the new ly captured Iraqis. missions to clear the road to Baghdad of Iraqi attackers. But it was at Najaf - a city of 300,000, 100 miles south of Baghdad — that U.S. military leaders were faced with a diffi cult decision. It was unclear whether the U.S. strategy is to take Najaf or simply to cordon off the city. There are too many Iraqi fight ers to bypass them or leave them unattended; they’re a danger to supply lines on the way to Baghdad. But if Najaf is a key stepping stone to the capital, it is also a dangerous one. On Saturday, a suicide attack killed four U.S. sol j„ i. „ Airborne Division sur rounded Najaf, preparing for a possible door-to door battle to root out Saddam Hussein’s fight ers—but leery of damaging some of the faith’s most sacred shrines. Further north, Army brigades rrpnt rlnc’pr tn “This is our type of fight. This is probably the most dangerous part of combat, and that’s urban. Sometimes you don’t find out who the enemy is until they’re shooting at you.” COMMAND SGT. MAJ. MARVIN HILL PART OF FORT CAMPBELL. KY.-BASED AIR ASSAULT DIVISION checkpoint north of town; on Sunday, nervous U.S. troops warned ap proaching drivers they would be shot if they did not leave the area. “TVtic ic Baghdad, advancing 10 miles with little resistance, though bat tles with the Republican Guard loomed. To the south, Marines launched “search-and-destroy” our type of fight,” said Command Sgt. Maj. Marvin Hill, of the Fort Campbell, Ky .-based air assault * AIRBORNE, SEE PAGE 3 Index Comics and Crossword 7 Classifieds 9 Horoscopes 7 Letters to the Editor_ 5 t , Online Poll __ 5 Police Report 4 Weather L TOMORROW & High 69 Low 49 In This Issue ♦ NEWS Read up on SG candidates before you vote on VIP. Page 2 ♦ VIEWPOINTS Tyler Jones counters criticism of Ludacris coming to 3 Rivers Music Festival. Page 5 ♦ THE MIX Check out a preview of this summer’s potential blockbusters. Page 6 ♦ SPORTS USC baseball sweeps Vanderbilt in a weekend series. Page 8 I Panel aims to aid soldiers’ loved ones Counseling Center offers programs to help students cope BY JESSICA CLANTON THE GAMECOCK The Counseling and Human Development Center is offering a panel discussion as well as group counseling to help students begin to cope with emotional strain caused by their loved ones being sent to war. Pete Liggett will be the moder ator of the discussion tonight from 5:30 to 7 in Russell House room 303. “Our role on this campus is to promote psychological and emo tional well-being through coun seling and outreach programs,” said Liggett, training director for the Counseling Center and a li censed clinical physiologist. “We have had a few students come in and express concerns about then loved ones at war, and we have re ceived phone calls from the USC Staff who have been approached by students that want to talk about the emotional impact of war. We will try to offer any coun seling service that is requested.” The panel discussion will fea ture psychologists, military per sonnel and people whose loved ones have been deployed in oth er wars. “I think this discussion is im portant because it gives students the opportunity to share their con cerns about their loved ones at war and they will be able to hear the experiences of others that may be similar to theirs and may offer some sort of support,” said panel member Ericka Stricklin-Parker, wmmmmmmmmSm■ a Counseling Center psychologist whose husband recently returned from Afghanistan. The panel discussion is open to any student, even those who do not have loved ones at war. “I think this war is very differ ent from the Gulf or any other war because of the live media co+erage, so even if students don’t have loved ones in the war they still could be affected by these live images of war,” Stricklin-Parker said. Although there are many dif ♦ PANEL, SEE PAGE 3 wmmmmmmmmmmtM