iatlg 3ar Hpri
POLICE
ROUNDUP
University
Tkwsfay, Apri 2
■ According to police reports, a non
forced entry burglary was reported in
the Thurston Bowles Building on
Thursday.
Nothing was stolen, but victims said
their computers had been used without
their permission after the building had
closed, reports stated.
WMbtsfay, April
■ An unidentified man threw an
umbrella at a Triangle Transit Authority
van about 1 p.m. and cracked the wind
shield, according to police reports.
TMMbf, March 31
■ A student reported her wallet
stolen while she was in a Howell Hall
bathroom Tuesday afternoon, police
reports state. The black leather wallet
contained 3 residence hall keys, cash,
credit cards and her UNC ONE Card,
reports state.
City
TharaAay, April 2
■ Jaime Odi Aguilar, 28, of Glen
Lennox Apartments, 8 Lanar Road, in
Chapel Hill was arrested for one misde
meanor count of driving with a license
revoked, one misdemeanor count of dri
ving while impaired, one misdemeanor
count of carrying a concealed weapon,
and one felony count of possession of
marijuana, police reports state.
Aguilar was stopped after an officer
noticed he was driving without head
lights. According to police reports,
Aguilar measured .11 on his breatha
lyzer test. Aguilar’s vehicle was
searched, and one gram of cocaine was
found.
Aguilar was confined to Orange
County Jail with a $2,000 secured bond.
His trial is scheduled for May 12 in
Chapel Hill District Court, reports state.
WadMsday, April 1
■ Shauna Clare Diehl, 21, of 7518-3
3 Trinity Court in Chapel Hill was
arrested for one misdemeanor count of
assault, and Antoinette Marie
Maynard, 26, of 900 W. Rosemary St
in Chapel Hill was arrested for one mis
demeanor count of communicating
threats, police reports state.
A victim reported that Maynard
approached her and threatened to “cut
her guts out” police reports state. The
victim then reported that Diehl struck
her over the head with a purse, police
reports state. According to police
reports, the victim had the women
taken before the magistrate where she
took out a criminal summons on them.
A trial date of April 20 was set for
Chapel Hill District Court.
■ An incident of damaged property
was reported on Chippoaks Drive in
Chapel Hill. According to police
reports, a suspect scratched the victims
car and wrote “bitch” on the hood and
trunk, police reports state.
Damage to the car’s paint was valued
at S4OO, reports state.
■ An incident of obtaining money
under false pretenses was reported
when a suspect used a former employ
er’s account to buy items, police reports
state.
According to police reports, one pair
of safety glasses valued at $6, three jig
saw blades valued at $5 and one jigsaw
kit valued at $l6O were reported stolen.
TMiday. March 31
■ Robert Tiron Henderson, 23, of
404 S. Greensboro St. in Chapel Hill,
was arrested for one misdemeanor
count of simple possession of schedule
VI drugs and one misdemeanor count
of resisting delay and obstructing an
officer, police reports state.
According to police reports, officers
found Henderson sitting on the path at
the rear of Southern Orange Human
Services at 412 Caldwell St. Upon
approach, Henderson threw down a
plastic bag which contained five grams
of marijuana. Henderson fled from the
scene and was later arrested, reports
state.
Henderson was confined to Orange
County Jail on a S3OO secured bond. A
trail date of April 27 was set for Chapel
Hill District Court, reports state.
■ According to police reports, two
incidents of breaking and entering
occurred on Sir Richard Lane. The dri
ver and passenger door and front left
quarter panel received $2,500 worth of
damage when a suspect attempted to
gain entry.
A second vehicle received S6OO
worth of damage to its door when the
suspect pried the door handle with a
crowbar to gain entry, police reports
state. Reported stolen were S6OO worth
of cash and five credit cards, which
were later recovered.
■ Demonta LeCarlos Caldwell, 23,
of 212 Lazy Creek Lane in Roxboro
was arrested on misdemeanor count of
possession of marijuana, police reports
state.
According to reports, Caldwell was
released on a S4OO unsecured bond. A
trail date of April 27 was set for Chapel
Hill District Court.
UNC appeals employee’s lawsuit
■ Diane Riggsbee-Raynor
lost her job in September
1995 and filed a grievance.
STAFF REPORT
The University appealed Thursday
the State Personnel Commission’s rec
ommendation to reinstate a School of
Medicine employee fired for falsifying
her timesheet in 1995.
Special Deputy Attorney General
Thomas Ziko and Assistant Attorney
General Sylvia Thibaut submitted a peti
tion in Wake County Superior Court on
Wednesday asking the court to reaffirm
Food
ferlMmgM
Professor Jim Ferguson is using
grant money to take his class to
France to study food and culture.
BY KAITLIN GURNEY
STAFF WRITER
Jim Ferguson declares food is the common
thread of life, weaving together students from
every walk of life and professors from every dis
cipline.
This is the philosophy Ferguson brings to his
enormously popular honors seminar, “What’s
For Dinner? A Multidisciplinary Inquiry into
Food and Culture,” which he fondly dubs “Eats
101.”
“Eats 101 is great because it begins with a com
mon interest we all share food,” he said.
“From there, we move to a larger consideration of
food and culture, which extends to archeology,
women’s studies, religion, economics and more.”
Ferguson, an American studies professor,
invites UNC faculty and
culinary experts to each
weekly discussion, so they
can relate their specialties
to the topic of food.
The second week of
class features a formal catered dinner. The five
course meal is attended by the faculty speakers for
upcoming classes.
“The dinner is sort of a puzzle, and the menu
Community pays respects to 13-year-old gunshot victim
BY HUGH PRESSLEY
STAFF WRITER
Cries of pain and thoughts of hope
filled the Triangle Presbyterian Church
on Thursday morning as friends and
family gathered together in Durham to
mourn the death of 13-year-old Laura
Ashley Williams.
Williams died Monday at UNC
Hospitals after shooting herself in the
head in a bathroom at Grey Culbreth
Middle School.
The Rev. L. Raymond Cobb II con
ducted the funeral in front of about 400
mourners and reminded them of the
legacy Wiliams left behind.
Russian journalist tells story of
captivity as Chechnyan prisoner
■ Yelena Masyuk was
covering the war between
Russia and Chechnya.
BY EMILY CRAMER
STAFF WRITER
Russian journalist Yelena Masyuk
visited Duke University on Thursday to
share her experiences covering the
recent war between Chechnya and
Russia —a battlefield as dangerous for
reporters as it was for soldiers.
Against the wishes of her employers,
Masypk managed to journey to
Chechnya to expose the horrors of the
war to the rest of the world.
“My editor didn’t want me to go
because I was a woman, but I tricked
him and went anyway," she said.
“Not to be there would have been a
let down because I was interested in
what was going on.”
She explained the plight of many
journalists who were often taken
hostage to obtain ransom money from
media outlets or killed by Chechnyan
soldiers.
“Any journalist that came to
the University’s firing of Diane
Riggsbee-Raynor.
The former administrative assistant in
the medical school’s Plastic Surgery
Division was dismissed in September
1995 for not reporting overtime hours.
The personnel commission stated
March 3 that the University fired
Riggsbee-Raynor without just cause and
that she should be reinstated.
The commission stated that she was
guilty of "inadequate performance” for
falsifying her work records but could not
be fired because supervisors signed her
timesheets.
Susan Ehringhaus, the University’s
legal counsel, was out of town and
AjiMjJMHHPMp I xjUnt sMi; ‘M
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prwDAvrosANDia
Jim Ferguson, a professor of American Studies, chats with former student Kristin Lyman about
their upcoming class trip to France. Ferguson taught an honors seminar titled "What's For
Dinner?' last semester, which relates different disciplines to food.
is full of clues,” he said. “It is constructed so the
elements on it will return throughout the class.”
inaugural fall 1997 class.
“The group took on a life of its own,” he said.
“We would get together after class for a dinner
that everyone was involved in fixing Our discus-
“She enriched the lives of those she
touched,” he said. “We’re thankful for
the cherished memories that can’t be
erased and for all the goodness of life.”
Williams loved swimming and
oceanography, horseback riding,
Shakespeare and— like most girls her
age chocolate, Cobb said. “She told
her parents that chocolate should have
its own food group,” he said.
Thinking of the things Williams most
enjoyed brought laughter and joy to
those who gathered to pay the girl their
last respects.
But despite those uplifting memories,
mourners still struggled to hold back
their emotions, as their hearts remained
Chechnya was considered an enemy,”
she said.
“At the end of the war, it became
profitable to kidnap journalists.”
On May 10,1997, Masyuk and two
colleagues were captured.
They were then held as prisoners for
101 days in the Chechnyan mountains.
“May 10 was the scariest day of my
life,” she said.
"We were captured by seven people
wearing ski masks.
“They took us to a nearby forest, took
all of our jewelry ... They roughed us
up.”
Masyuk said they were held in the
cellar of a house for 10 days until
Chechnyan rebels payed their captors
the equivalent of $50,000 to gain cus
tody.
They were then transported to a cave,
where they spent the remainder of then
days in captivity.
“We spent three months in a grotto at
the altitude of 4,500 meters,” she said.
“It was very hard to live in those con
ditions because it was raining almost
every day and our clothes were always
soaked.”
Masyuk said they received very little
food and that they were constantly mis-
NEWS
could not be reached Thursday.
Alan McSurely, who represents
Riggsbee-Raynor, said the University’s
“head in the sand” procedure didn’t
make sense.
“It’s hard for me to understand why
the University does this, to be honest,”
he said.
Riggsbee-Raynor said in March that
her supervisors told her to take vacation
time after docking the hours.
But months after she returned the
University fired her for falsifying her
work record, she said.
The case made it to a University
grievance panel, which requested
Riggsbee-Raynor be reinstated, but
At the conclusion of each
class, Ferguson and the stu
dents get together for dinner.
Ferguson said this was a
practice that simply evolved
throughout the course of the
full of unanswered questions.
Chapel Hill police spokeswoman
Jane Cousins said police could not offer
answers to any of these questions.
“The police department’s role was to
investigate the shooting, and we con
cluded that it was a self-inflicted gunshot
wound,” she said. “There was no foul
play involved.”
Cousins said the gun Williams used
in the shooting belonged to a family
member.
In spite of the facts of the incident,
Cobb asked the congregation to look to
God for all the answers.
“There is no doubt that the question
why has crossed each of our minds.
“The guards smoked a lot of
pot, and they
sometimes overreacted
threatening to chain
or kill us.”
YBEUMSWI
Russian journalist
treated by their guards.
“The food was pita bread from a
neighboring village, and it was not well
baked,” she said.
“The guards smoked a lot of pot, and
they sometimes overreacted threat
ening to chain us or kill us. They were
trying to break us psychologically.”
Masyuk and her colleagues were
finally released when their employers
fronted $2 million to the Chechnyan
captors.
But the vicious cycle only continued,
and the risks of covering the war did not
equal the consequences, she said.
“Each time one journalist was freed,
another was kidnapped,” she said.
“Right now, I think going back to
Chechnya is not worth it.”
Chancellor Michael Hooker refused,
standing behind the firing.
Riggsbee-Raynor and McSurely
appealed Hooker’s decision in Wake
County Superior Court.
Administrative Law Judge Sammie
Chess Jr. said in June 1997 that
Riggsbee-Raynor was held to different
work standards than other University
employees.
He cited a report that found other
workers taking vacations after docking
overtime hours without being punished.
Chess recommended the University
reinstate Riggsbee-Raynor and reim
burse her for attorney’s fees and back
wages.
sions would carry over, and it was this time that
caused to classroom boundaries to dissolve.”
At the end of the course, the students turned
the tables and fixed Ferguson a formal dinner at
his house.
“It isn’t a cooking class, but that did become a
sub-theme,” he said. “Food brought both the
course and us together.”
Ferguson is the author of several culinary
themed books, the most recent of which is
See FERGUSON, Page 4
Why should the potential that she rep
resented go unfulfilled?” he said.
“We simply don’t know why. We
must look to God who does know the
answer.... It can actually be freeing to
us that there are some things in this life
that we can’t understand.”
Williams’ body will be cremated and
her ashes will be spread off Shell Island
in the Gulf of Mexico, Cobb said.
“It was a place where her mom and
dad taught her how to fish ... and per
haps that was the place where her desire
for oceanography was started,” he said.
There will also be markers placed in
Chapel Hill to honor the memory of
Williams, Cobb said.
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DTH/ION GARDINER
Yelena Masyuk, a Russian journalist who was kidnapped in Chechnya last
year and held more than 100 days, speaks at Duke University on Thursday.
Friday, April 3,1998
Property
value study
discussed
■ The Chapel Hill Town
Council continued a public
Meadowmont hearing.
BY ROBIN CLEMOW
STAFF WRITER
The Chapel Hill Town Council con
tinued for yet another night its public
hearings over the issue of a connecting
road.
Council members heard arguments
both for and against the approval of a
special-use permit for the mixed-use
development known as Meadowmont,
a proposed area of shopping centers,
homes, parks and a school.
Last spring the council passed the
special-use per
mits, but the rul
ing was over
turned when resi
dents of Pinehurst
Drive, a neighbor
hood with a pro
posed connector
road to
Meadowmont,
fought against the
development.
Residents claimed
the road and its
increased traffic
would have a neg
ative effect on
property values.
The Town
ra
Chapel Hill Mayor
ROSEMARY
WALDORF
said the council would
hear all the facts on
property values before
making a decision.
Council must now decide whether to
reapprove the permit in light of new evi
dence presented at the hearings.
Meadowmont developer East West
Partners and residents added to their
cases Thursday by looking at numerous
studies of other areas feeing similar traf
fic problems.
Robert Sprouse of Picket Sprouse
Real Estate spoke on behalf of the
developer, saying studies of develop
ment areas in the Triangle, such as
Finley Forest and Woodcroft, were
proof that prices were not negatively
affected by traffic. The average increase
in prices was similar for roads both
heavily traveled and for those with a
lower traffic volume, as well, he said.
Sprouse also said studies done on
Pinehurst Drive since the preliminary
stages of the potential development
showed that buyers were not scared off
by traffic. “The homes on Pinehurst
Drive have increased in value, and the
increase was equal to those off
Pinehurst Drive,” he said.
Michael Brough, the residents’ attor
ney, said homes in the same study area
sold for less per square-foot on heavily
traveled roads.
Developer Roger Perry pointed out,
though, that square-footage did not
include garages or porches, which
added value to the homes studied.
George Chrisbalm with East West
Partners spoke to the council about traf
fic increases, saying the increases, due to
Meadowmont by 2006, would comprise
a relatively small percentage of the
heavier traffic. “Meadowmont will
comprise 25 percent of the traffic
(increase) that is out there and only 25
percent,” he said.
Although the discussion went on for
hours Thursday night, the issue is still
short reaching its final conclusion.
Mayor Rosemary Waldorf said the
council had to hear all the facts and
arguments before a decision could be
made. “What we’re doing right now is
asking questions and getting answers.”
3