Breaking news: It happens again.
 

Man found dead at CU fraternity
By Bernie Morson, Rocky Mountain News
September 17, 2004

An official from the Boulder County coroner's office came to the Chi Psi fraternity home on the University of Colorado campus Friday morning to investigate the death of an 18-year-old male student whose body was found at the house.

The coroner was still at the home at 1080 14th St. at 12:30 p.m.

Julie Brooks, Boulder police spokeswoman, said someone called 911 to report the body at 8:57 a.m. She said the body showed no signs of trauma. Police are not releasing his name or saying whether he was a member of the fraternity. They do not know how long he had been dead.

His body was found in a common area inside the three-story brick, neo-classical fraternity house where 39 members live, Brooks said.

Friday morning, many of the fraternity brothers were being questioned by police.

None would comment to reporters.

Neighbors said they heard music and normal activity at the house Thursday night, but they indicated there were no parties going on, at least that they could hear.

Thursday was the last day of rush, or freshman pledge week, for many Greek houses on campus.



http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drm...189637,00.html

More info from the Daily Camera:
Student found dead in Boulder fraternity
By Camera staff
September 17, 2004

An 18-year-old University of Colorado student was found dead this morning inside the Chi Psi fraternity house on University Hill in Boulder, police said.

A member of the fraternity called police around 9 a.m.

There were no obvious signs of trauma, but police are still investigating.

The man's name is not being released, pending family notification.

Several Boulder fraternities and sororities were holding midday parties Thursday to celebrate the end of CU's Rush Week, and police are investigating whether there was a party at the Chi Psi house, at 1080 14th St.

Today, members of the fraternity lined up at the house to go in one by one to retrieve their belongings. The men were visibly upset, but would not comment.

One said into a cell phone: "Dude, one of the pledges died."

This is not meant to belittle the tragedy, whatever it turns out to be, but it does bring back into focus some of the things we've discussed before about dealing with an event like this one. Nobody but a chapter advisor should be saying anything about what happened -- especially when the media is present. You might not even know a reporter is present if they don't have a camera, tape recorder or other equipment with them, so it is best to simply keep quiet anywhere in public.

It is terrible that two fatal incidents would happen so close together at schools of such close proximity.

how sad for all those concerned...
thoughs and prayers are with them.

I do not condone booze in chapter houses but lets get real how many college students are found dead of an overdose in dorm rooms year after year and the stories don't even make the paper.

I'm sorry but around here any student death makes the papers and/or the tv news....

I agree. We're way to quick to try to deflect "blame" if there is any on the media. If there wasn't a story, they couldn't cover it.

Here's a link to the Rocky Mountain News coverage:

http://rockymountainnews.com/drmn/st...191935,00.html

University of Colorado Grief Counselors have said that alcohol may have been a part of this tragedy.

At our university, any kid found dead, whether it be in a dorm, an off campus house or greek housing, it was covered. No offense to Chi Psi, and my prayers are with this family, but if something happened to this kid on their watch, they should pay the penalty. It's so damn sad nobody looked out for the kid.

Same in Boston.

And I agree that the chapter needs to be held responsible if the student was in their house.

~ Mel.

Not only that, Tom, it is almost always a death sentence on the chapter, even if the chapter is cleared of wrongdoing - the PR is too overwhelmingly negative.

This is getting frustrating to see this so much in Colorado this year...I've been a lukewarm advocate of enforcing greek systems to go dry, but the more stories like this I see, especially considering the CSU case and my attachment to the house in question, heats up my support more and more.

A double whammy like this one will almost certainly force the issue here in Colorado.

I've never been an advocate of dry housing, but have thought for quite a while that it is inevitable as long as chapters don't enforce their rules and obey the laws.

It's possible, maybe even likely, that sooner or later the fact that, "everybody drinks underage in college," isn't going to matter any more. The schools will move back toward more "In Loco Parentis," the university and city police will crack down and a lot of students will suffer.

when is the last time a school ever took responsibility for a student that was found dead in a dorm?

This happens all the time. Just off the top of my head at schools I'm close to, MIT is currently being sued for the death of an undergraduate in her dorm room (a suicide). Harvard was raked across the coals in the national press for a murder-suicide that's still impacting its reputation ten years later. NYU is taking a terrific beating at the moment for a number of student deaths on campus, including one that resulted from drug use, and the lawsuits are beginning to roll in.

I can't, however, think of the last time I read about a student found dead of alcohol poisoning in a dorm.

"Everybody drinks underage in college" is a copout - an easy way to not focus on a real, life-threatening problem. We should not be ignoring the problem, just because "everybody does it," - we should be setting the standard, as fraternities started out to do.

Think about it - when was Greek Life truly the dominating force of leadership and postive examples on a campus? I would posit that this has not been the case in a majority of campuses since the late 1950-early 1960's, right about the time that in loco parentis started to be removed.

That is not to say greeks are no longer the leaders, but, in most cases, I would say it IS true, and, in many cases, the examples we set, are NOT the examples we should be setting (i.e. the leaders on the social scene...or the leaders for the most on-the-bleeding-edge of behaviors).

In too many cases, we have strayed too far from the original founding ideals of our organizations. I see movement back towards those ideals, which is encouraging, but, I have a feeling that society in general would judge us as being "too little, too late" in doing so.

when is the last time a school ever took responsibility for a student that was found dead in a dorm?
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That doesn't mean the school is taking responsibility. They do everything possible to point the blame elsewhere. If a student drinks in the dorms and eventually dies at a fraternity house then they blame the fraternity because it is their house. If a student drinks at a fraternity and dies in the dorms then the school blames the fraternity becase they served the student.

You went to Penn, right? Do you remember a couple of years ago when a Penn grad died at the FIJI house? He has been drinking all day at the lacrosse game. After the game he went bar hopping. After that he went back to the house and fell down the back steps. The house was owned by Penn. The back steps didn't have a railing which was required by local BOCA codes and Penn's internal memos proved that Penn knew about problem. According to Penn's contract with the fraternity, Penn was responsible for the maintenance of the house. How did Penn accept responsiblilty? They responded by suspending the fraternity.