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ANDERSON COOPER
PRESIDENTIAL FIRESIDE CHAT
The Pendul
ELON, NORTH CAROLINA | WEDNESDAY, APRIL 8, 2009 | VOLUME 35, EDITION 11’
www.elon.edu/pendulum
page 20
FLYING PHOENIV^'
Women’s Ultimate
Frisbee advances to
regional tournament
Report challenges Alamance sheriff
Elon professor’s study says 850 more Hispanics were stopped than sheriff reported
KajeauxCoity
w Edita
An Elon professor’s
independent research has
provided a new challenge to
the Alamance County sheriff’s
assertions that his deputies are
not going out of their way to
slop Hispanic drivers to check
liis or her immigration status.
After Alamance County
Sheriff Terry Johnson said
publicly in February that his
deputies had made traffic stops
on 494 Hispanic drivers from
2004 to 2008, Elon political
science professor Laura Roselle
conducted her own study of
traffic data using statistics filed
with the state government.
She found the total was
actually 1,344 for the same
period — 850 more than
Johnson reported.
Roselle, who has been critical
m the past of the Alamance
County Sheriff Department’s
actions on this issue, SiEojipea
short on Sunday of claiming the
statistical difference represents
the practice of racial profiling.
But she said the big
difference in figures raises
questions about the sheriff’s
accountability on a sensitive
topic.
“There are many good
people working in that sheriff’s
department,” Roselle said.
"There are men and women
doing a really good job and
■ understand they put their
lives on the line to protect
wd defend. I think this whole
thing does them a tremendous
disservice.”
Randy Jones, a spokesman
for the department, played
down the statistical difference
and said Monday the variation
in numbers is primarily the
result of software difficulties
the department has dealt with
for years. He said the variation
is true not only for cases
involving Hispanic drivers, but
all stops of motorists.
“It’s a combination of
human error, paperwork
errors, computer errors and
major software errors we’ve
been dealing with (for) some
time,” Jones said. “I don’t see
how racial profiling could be
involved if it affects everyone
across the board.”
At Monday night’s county
commissioners meeting. Chief
Deputy Tim Britt echoed Jones’s
statements. He said back in
March, the sheriff’s department
found they had “grossly
underreported traffic stops in
all demographic groups.”
said they have been
'worldng*ever sfn«' ttT corretf
the data and to employ a new
system.
“The problem with the
previous system was that there
were no checks and balances,”
Britt said. “Wehaveimplemented
some internal safeguards and
some new procedures to correct
that."
According to Britt, they
now have a staff member that
reviews the traffic stop data
weekly from the office and will
have a full report to the board in
30 days with the correct data.
“We certainly don’t have
anything to hide, this was not
by design or intentional,” Britt
said. “It was simply an error.”
DEREK NOBLE | Photographer
At a county commtssionors meeting on Monday night, Alamance County Sheriff Terry Johnson briefly addressed the Alamance County
Commissioners on recent allegations of racial profiling in traffic stops.
He claimed that accusations
of profiling made against the
sheriff’s department were
unfair and unwarranted.
“I think what is being done
to the sheriff’s office, what is
being done to us, is the same
thing we’re being accused
of,” Britt said. “We’re being
profiled and put into a group
because somebody doesn’t like
a particular program.
Commissioner Tim Sutton
has backed Johnson’s policies
in the past, and he did so again
before Monday’s meeting by
questioning Roselle’s purposes,
“I have never seen such an
obsessed attack on government
in my life," Sutton said. “It’s
stunning to me that people
don’t want to address the
problem of illegal immigration
and don’t want to address the
processes needed to do so.”
At issue behind all of
this is the sheriff’s embrace
of a section of a federal
immigration law that allows
local law enforcement agencies
to arrest and detain people
found to be in the United States
illegally. Section 287 (g) of the
Illegal Immigration Reform
and Immigrant Responsibility
Act and Immigration and
See TRAFFIC I PAGE 3
Chemistry professor dies in University Drive accident
Chemistry professor Eugene Gooch
ued Friday night at 6:47 p.m. when
aniotorist struck him while he was
'■'ning his bicycle on University Drive
Mar Highway 87. Gooch was riding
the same direction as the car
at hit him, when the car crossed over
D o the shoulder where Gooch was
Kling. He died at the scene of the
accident.
The driver was identified Monday
™rmng by Capt. Craig Andrews of Elon
ofH K Davis Murphy, a resident
Hwron Church Road in Mebane, was
behind the wheel
ofthe2005Buick
that struck and
killed Gooch.
Murphy is in her
early 80s.
According to
Elon police, no
charges have
beenfiledagainst
Murphy at this
time and the
investigation is
ongoing. Alcohol
does not appear
to be a factor
Gooch
Professor
in the incident.
Gooch joined the university as a
faculty member in 1988, specializing
in chemical education and organic
chemistry. He taught two sections of
organic chemistry II, a section of general
chemistry and medicinal chemistry
this semester.
“Qene Gooch was a complex guy,
said Dan Wright, chair of the chemistry
department. “He was bright and
passionate about teaching organic
chemistry. He might not always have
had the right technique m teachmg
organic, but he would try new thmgs
trying to find that special method that
would make students learn.”
Students and faculty have written
notes and posted them on the corkboard
outside of Gooch’s office on the third
floor of McMichael Science building.
A 1000 mL graduated cylinder and
ErienmV tl.sk tlM w"h
have been placed m front of his ottice
dow, a door, according to several
students that was rarely ever shut.
“He Icived student interaction, said
rarlv Fabrizio a junior biochemistry
Sor who has had three classes with
Gooch, including
this spring, and is one of his organic
chemistry teaching assistants
“He was always rocking out to jazz
la
He loved life, he loved this building and he loved Elon. I guess I
never really realized what he added to my chemistry experience
until now that he’s gone.
- Sarah Denin
JUNIOR CHEMISTRY MAJOR m
music in his office,” she said.
Gooch was an avid jazz enthusiast
and had planned to teach a global
studies class in the fall called
“Rediscovering Rembrandt, a course
connecting chemistry and art.
“I remember one story in particular,
which characterizes the teachings of
Dr Gooch,” said senior Philip Zakas,
who took four classes with Gooch. “On
his way to work one day, he ran out of
gas and was stranded in the McMichael
parking lot. Without concern, Dr. Gooch
simply mixed a few organic conyjounds
from the chemistry lab, emptied a flask
of combustible hquid into his German-
made automobile and was able to drive
to a gas station. His lesson was that
there are always several answers to
a problem, and there is always a new
approach to a common dilemma.
Gooch lives on through such
humorous stories and through his love
for his life, Zakas said.
“He loved life, he loved this building
and he loved Elon,” said Sarah Denin,
a junior chemistry major. “I guess I
never really realized what he added to
my chemistry experience until now that
he’s gone.”
Faculty in the chemistry department
are not only having to deal with the
emotional loss of a coworker and
friend, but are having to manage the
four courses Gooch was teaching this
semester as well.
“I’m grieving for my friend and
colleague, and I’m having to worry about
the logistics of how to cover his classes,”
Wright said. “If I could magically talk to
him this morning he would have said,
‘Dan, focus on the latter. Take care of
the students.’ That says a lot about how
much he cared about his students.”
Assistant professor of chemistry Lisa
Ponton will teach a large lecture in order
to take over Gooch’s general chemistry
courses and Joel Karty will be taking
See GOOCH I PAGE 5