On Wednesday, March 24, the Student Affairs Committee (SAC) ruled in the case brought against the on-campus fraternity Kappa Omega Epsilon (KOE) for alleged misconduct . The fraternity had been charged with "violation of quiet hours," "failure to comply with the requests of campus security," and "disorderly conduct," as the result of an incident which occurred at the end of last semester.

KOE had accepted the first of the three charges, but decided to contest the latter two, which led to the SAC hearings. The hearing began with an introduction of the facts by Professor Christanne Miller who had been named as an impartial third party with the task of collecting data on the incident. This was followed by presentations from both KOE and Pomona College, with both sides calling several witnesses. KOE was represented by its fraternity president Dave Jensen ’99, and the College was represented by Dean Matt Taylor.

In the end, the SAC ruled against KOE and upheld all three charges of misconduct. The SAC then decided on a punishment for the fraternity, which included mandatory letters of apology to Campus Security and the RAs involved, ten hours of community service per student, and the loss of access to campus facilities for the duration of this semester, including the social room where the fraternity usually holds its socials.

The charges and the subsequent punishment stemmed from an incident which took place at the final social hosted by KOE in December. On the last Thursday night of the semester, KOE held its regular social in Social Room 7. The social, which according to school policy was supposed to be over by midnight, had extended after 12:00am. RA Scott Lamb went down to the social room and told the fraternity that it needed to end the social and clean up. As Lamb said, "I was not forceful about it; I pretty much left it up to them, but told them the on-call RA would probably come down soon."

Soon after, RA Chad Thorton entered the social room and notified KOE that they would have to shut the social down. Ricky Holloman ’99, a recent initiate of KOE who graduated last semester, left the social at that point and exited towards Walker Beach. According to Jensen, Holloman was "visibly upset and stormed out." Several KOE members followed Holloman out with the intention of calming him down and taking him home. At the same time, according to Jensen, KOE started to shut down the social.

In a Clark I courtyard, Holloman ran into Thorton and Lamb. According to Lamb, there was a small crowd, composed of both KOE members and other individuals. The two RAs saw that one of the individuals with Holloman had been cut with a knife and was bleeding, and tried to determine what had happened to him. Holloman and others began shouting at Thorton, and the two RAs left and returned shortly with Campus Security.

Several people congregated in the courtyard, and Holloman continued to be hostile towards both Thorton and Campus Security. As Lamb said, "he was definitely very belligerent." There is confusion about what exactly was said and done by Holloman; apparently Holloman had made threats against Thorton earlier in the evening, but rumors about the involvement of a knife have been unsubstantiated. Lamb has said that he never saw a knife that evening.

Several more Security officers were called, and the incident ended with Security dispersing the crowd and separating Holloman from other KOE members present. Later that evening, Dean Quinley was notified of the incident, and she proceeded to contact the Claremont Police Department, which arrested Holloman.

In the Security incident report, four members of KOE were implicated in the altercation. No action was taken against individuals; rather, the school decided to take action against the fraternity as a whole. This decision was apparently made at the suggestion of Dean Quinley.

KOE is currently appealing the SACís decision. Several of KOEís members have expressed frustration with the way in which their case was handled by the SAC. KOE expressed concern that perhaps there was a anti-fraternity bias on the committee. As Jensen pointed out, "One SAC member walked into the hearing fifteen minutes late, missing the impartial reading of the facts." The fraternity is most likely going to appeal on procedural grounds, citing this as one example.

KOE member Mike Misra ’99 questioned the impartiality of SAC members. Misra, a witness in the hearing, felt that ìseveral of the members had already made up their mind about our guilt before they had heard all the evidence.î Misra also said, ìI felt that certain members of the SAC who asked me questions were intentionally trying to make me contradict myself.î Because the hearings are confidential, SAC member acting Dean of Students Toni Clark had no comment.

Of the punishment itself, Jensen said that the restriction on the use of campus facilities was "unfairly harsh." KOE’s membership is overwhelmingly composed of seniors, with only two juniors and no underclassmen. "Without the socials," said Jensen, "we will be unable to recruit new members for next year. This is very disappointing. We all put a lot of time into this fraternity."

The request for an appeal by KOE is due by Friday, and if granted, another hearing will take place. But even if the decision is reversed, it is unlikely that KOE will be able to hold any events this semester.