College Shorts Protest at Columbia and other news

Author: Tom Brant

Protest urges Columbia to discipline students

Supporters of immigration control protested Thursday at Columbia University in an effort to get the school to sanction students who interrupted an October speech by Jim Gilchrist, the founder of the anti-illegal immigration Minuteman Project.

Students from a campus club, the Chicano Caucus, entered the stage with banners denouncing the Minuteman Project during the Oct. 4 speech.

Joanna Marzullo, president of New Yorkers for Immigration Control and Enforcement, called for Columbia to expel the students in an interview with The Associated Press. She claimed that the students were violent towards Gilchrist.

In a video of the conflict, students were shown shouting and tussling with Minuteman supporters, but no violence was apparent.

The Chicano Caucus told the AP that there was no interference with the right to free speech, and rejected the claim that any of their members attacked Gilchrist.

-CNN.com


College president gets probation for embezzling

Dolores Cross, former president of Morris Brown College, was sentenced to five years of probation and a year of home confinement in a U.S. District Court on Wednesday, The Associated Press reported. She was charged with embezzling millions in federal loans and grants meant for student tuition.

Cross, 70, who was president of the African-American college in Atlanta from 1998-2002, pleaded guilty in May to embezzling $3.4 million in Pell grants and student loans, according to the AP. The school was faced with a $3.3 million debt during her time in office. Cross and financial aid director Parvesh Singh used the $3.4 million to pay off the debt and cover operating costs.

According to the AP, Singh and Cross applied for the loans using names of fictitious students, or students who had already graduated. These students did not know about the loans or the fact that they were expected to repay them, the AP said.

"I am very sorry for the conduct that has caused me to plead guilty," Cross told the AP. "I allowed this situation to continue even though, as president, I should have addressed it immediately."

-CNN.com


UPenn professor faces charges in wife's death

A University of Pennsylvania economics professor was charged Monday with beating his wife to death after she made her plans to divorce him public, The Associated Press reported.

Rafael Robb, 56, had been a suspect in the murder since his wife Ellen, 49, was found beaten to death at their home in Upper Merion Township Dec. 22, according to the AP.

Montgomery County District Attorney Bruce Castor said several pieces of evidence, such as a broken window, led authorities to believe the scene was staged to look like a burglary. For instance, broken glass from the door window had not been crushed underfoot or tracked throughout the house, Castor told the AP.

Robb was charged with first- and third-degree murder, possession of an instrument of crime, tampering with evidence and lying to authorities.

-FOXNews.com