Still Hoping to Dance
Men’s basketball team keeps its NCAA tourney hopes alive with a win over Cal /16
MONDAY
March 5, 2001
Of interest...
Columnist Shant Minas argues that a revamped University Village will improve USC / 4
Student newspaper of the University of Southern California
News Digest 2		Calendar 2
Opinions	4	Lifestyle 7
The Butt	7	Classifieds 12
Crossword	13	Sports IS
vol. CXXXXII. no. 36		www.usc.edu/dt
Patel, Brooks win in landslide
Ticket nearly doubles nearest opponents; a complaint is filed against judicial decision allowing them to run
Senate
winners
—♦— Residential
Chrysta Wilson
Paul Payne
Amir Shaikh
Brandon Ahu
James
Nussbaumer*
♦could face a recount challenge from Sameer Amin
■
Commuter
Sarah Talei
Anne Landry
Veronica
Kuiumdjian
Jared Eng
••received three write-in votes; may be ruted ineligible or face a recount
Greek
Justin
Weissman
Bill Karns
For complete results, see the Daily Trojan online: wwwoisc.edu/dt
OTHER RACES
-♦-
‘Democratic,’BASS, slates split residential seats; one commuter wins with 3 votes
By KATIE WERNER
Student Senate Writer
After all of the controversy over the Student Senate presidential race, the overshadowed election for the five residential senator positions proved much closer—with a nearly even split betw&n rival slates and the potential for a recount between two candidates who finished just seven votes apart
Chrysta Wilson easily finished first with 493 votes. Paul Payne, the editor in chief of the Trojan Horse newspaper, overcame his legal battle with the Elections Commission to finish second with 449. Both Wilson and Payne are members of the Students for a Democratic Campus slate.
But finishing just behind Payne with 438 votes was Amir Shaikh of the B.A&S. slate. Brandon Ahu, also a B AS.S. member, was fourth with 408.
James Nussbaumer of the ‘Democratic, slate appears to have finished fifth with 382 votes. But B.A.S.S. candidate Sameer Amin is just seven votes behind, and could request a recount under Senate rules.
“It was a very tight race, and hopefully those results are accurate," said Shaikh, a sophomore majoring in gerontology and public policy and management “I look forward to working with...all the other senators.”
I see Senator*, page 2 I
Randall Yong I Daily Troian
Celebration. President-elect Hema Patel embraces a supporter after the Senate announced her unofficial victory in the long, chaotic election.
“We won by an overwhelming margin despite all the negative publicity surrounding the campaign. If the student body has such great confidence in us, maybe Mike Matoba should consult a dictionary definition of‘democracy’ and defer to the will of the people.”
-*-
HEMA PATEL president-elect
“These injustices (in the Judicial Council hearing on Patel’s candidacy) undermine the Constitution of the Student Senate and allow justice to be mocked!9
MICHAEL MATOBA AND YVETTE OLLADA in their complaint against the Judicial Council
By KATIE WERNER
Student Senate Writer
Hema Patel and Craig Brooks won the positions of Student Senate president and vice president by a large margin, elections officials announced Friday after a week of delay and controversy.
“We are very excited about taking office and serving the student body in the coming year,” said President-elect Patel, a junior majoring in international relations and political science. “We are pleased that the students at USC were able to overlook the unproven accusations and rumors and affirm our candidacy by such an overwhelming margin.” Patel and Brooks received nearly twice as many votes as their nearest opponents, Nick Stein and Peter Kazanjian. Stein and Kazanjian were just nine votes ahead of John Terzian and Ashley Bettencourt
The results are unofficial until they are formally certified, which could happen as early as Tuesday.
Patel and Brooks overcame a number of complaints and challenges to their candidacy. On Wednesday, the Senate judicial Council overturned the Elections Commission’s Feb. 21 decision to disqualify the Patel/Brooks ticket Even now, the ticket may face another challenge. Michael Matoba. executive director of Program Board, and Yvette Ollada, assistant director of elections and recruitment filed a complaint Friday against the Judicial Council challenging its decision in the Patel/Brooks case.
The complaint claims that there were fatal flaws in the Judicial
I see Praaldancy. page 3 I
Unofficial
results
Hema Patel & Craig Brooks
1290 (32.0%)
Nick Stem & Peter Kazanjian
672 (16.6%)
John Terzian & Ashley Bettencourt
663 (16.4%)
Andrew Bulbrook & Jocelyn Liu
625 (15.5%)
Brian Hassan & Kush Desai 471 (11.7%)
Michael Cooper & Jenna Slosson 195 (4.8%)
Lucas Foletta & Courtney Philips
109 (2.7%)
Alexander Boofus & Bobby Love (write-in)
3 (0.1%)
Other write-ins 9 (0.2%)
A decade later, panels focus on King beating
Retrospective: Root causes, long-term consequences of incident are discussed
By AMELIA WONG
Contributing Writer
Speaking about police reform, economic development and the media, three panels reflected Saturday on the progress of Los
Angeles toward racial equality 10 years after Los Angeles police officers Were caught on videotape beating Rodney King in a scandal that helped set off the LA. riots of 1992.
The event held at Annenberg Auditorium and sponsored by the Institute for Justice and Journalism at USC and the Black Journalists Association, focused on the root causes of the beating.
Members of the first panel debat-
ed the changes that have taken place in the Los Angeles Police Department following the King beating in 1991.
The King case “caused the most profound (reform) of the police department..the videotape proved there was merit in (minority groups’) charges of beatings,” said Melanie Lomax, former president of the Los Angeles Police Commission.
LAPD Chief Bernard Parks stressed problems that police officers
have in implementing reform measures because of mixed political messages that the public sends, such as demanding a war on drugs and crime but at the same time desiring community-based policing.
“(The) police department consistently deals with failings of the social service system," said Parks, who advised people to “stay away from stereotyping as if this singular thing l see King, page 2 I
TAs seek to improve their lot as university workers
Graduates: Assistants hope for better benefits, wages, restrictions on workload
By YVONNE NGAI
Staff Writer
Receiving recognition as university employees would help teaching assistants enjoy their jobs more, said Jennifer Vega, a graduate student in education and the president
Grad Student life
PART 10F4
of the Graduate and Professional Student Senate.
“The university considers us as apprentices, because then they don’t
have to give us full benefits,” she said. “We get a stipend of teaching days, and we don’t get employee benefits— no vision, no dental.”
What they do get is the teaching stipend, USC health insurance, free Student Health Center services and five years of paid tuition for 12 units per semester, including the summer. The health benefits were implemented at the beginning of the fall, the result of negotiations last year between TAs and the university.
The minimum stipend for a 50-percent TA, who teaches 20 hours per week or more, rose at the beginning of the fall semester to $14,000, before taxes, for a 10-month contract The 11-percent increase was also a result of last year’s negotiations, Vega said. The majority of TAs are 50-percent TAs.
i	see	page SI
► Grad student by day, DJ by night: Lifestyle profiles Ed Vessel / 7
Arrest made in alumna’s rape, killing
A suspect was arrested in Michigan on Friday for the alleged carjacking, rape and murder of Roberta Happe, a 1999 USC graduate.
Los Angeles resident Jason Thompson, 23, was taken into custody after police in Saginaw, Mich, received a tip from Culver City police. The arrest came the day before Happe’s friends and family held a memorial service at Crescenta Valley High School, her alma matet Thompson's arrest gave some consolation to Happe's family and friends, for whom the healing process has just begun.
“Now, of course, we have the long haul which we will be going through," said Edie Happe, Roberta's mother, to CBS 2 News. “But the good news is just fantastic.”
Thompson, an alleged gang member, could face the death penalty if he is convicted of sexually abusing, kidnapping and murdering Happe on Feb. 22. He now faces extradition to California.
—Jeff Sklar, Assignment Editor