Newspapers / The Daily Tar Heel. / Oct. 17, 2007, edition 1 / Page 1
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VOLUME 115, ISSUE 95 Group names top search firm Bk_ M DTH/ZACH HOFFMAN The chancellor search committee decided Tuesday to pursue negotiations with Bill Funk of R. William Funk & Associates. T-SHIRTS FOR NON-TERRORISTS L M-Afc , . ? r f . )1 ] I 1 .^r : jjgjSU K IS . .... jHinH' Kp|gfl| |w >-Srj?.~. jT ' . X -j9L aShI i- • -> nHHHHHB _ nBnHHnaaHBmHHHmHBMami DTH/LISA KEATON Senior Mike Mallah (center) sells "Not A Terrorist' T-shirts on his Web site with the help of friends Atif Mohiuddin (left), Fahmida Azad, Anna Mansour and Monjurul Dolon. BY CINDY PORTER STAFF WRITER Mike Mallah is a senior biology major, AT&T employee, family man and Palestinian. Oh, and he’s not a terrorist. Mallah is the owner of notawear.com, a three-week-old company designed to challenge Middle Eastern stereotypes and to help support his family. Both online and around campus, Mallah sells black T-shirts with “Not A Terrorist” printed in bold red and white letters. The company’s name is a play on words, meaning those who fall victim to stereo types are “not aware.” Mallah said that the name came easy but that he found it difficult to establish his own company. ‘Ray of hope’ legacy lives on in others BY JENNY TANG STAFF WRITER The end of Jason Ray’s life was the beginning of his legacy. Asa tribute to Ray, who played UNC’s mascot for three years and died last spring, ESPN’s news show “E:60” featured the highlights of that legacy Tuesday evening. About 50 people attended a campus viewing of the feature, which showed the important roles Ray played without the Rameses mask —a Bible study leader, a college band member and an organ donor. Ray died last spring after he was struck by a sport utility vehicle in New Jersey, where he was set to perform as Rameses for the UNC men’s basketball team during the NCAA tournament. 18 Days left until one-stop voting ends. Early voting starts Monday. Visit www.co.orange.nc.us/elect (Fbr Sailu (Far Mrel UNC senior Mike Mallah sells T-shirts to break down stereotypes and to support his widowed mother and siblings. “It’s like when you see a performance,” he said. “It looks so easy, but you don’t see the 20 hours of practice that went into it that week. It’s a lot of background work.” Mallah made his own “Not A Terrorist” shirt three years ago and received such a huge reaction that he decided to print and sell the shirts. Some of Mallah’s friends later got involved with the project by helping build the Web site and market the product. Mallah has sold about 25 shirts so far, including to patrons in Chicago and New York. Part of the proceeds from shirt sales go toward Seeds of Peace, an organization that brings together Palestinian and Israeli teenagers for weekly meetings as part of “He gave his all to everything he did,” said junior Brad Lockwood, who Ray mentored and taught to be a mascot. “Even now, his death isn’t even real. His aura, his presence is still there,” said Lockwood, who attended the campus screening. “If he knew how many people he touched and impacted, he would be filled with such happiness.” The segment featured testimo nials of five people whose lives were saved or improved by Ray’s tissue and organ donations. “There are over 98,000 people on the organ waiting list,” Karen Rosner, a heart transplant recipi ent and Raleigh resident who attended the campus viewing. SEE JASON RAY, PAGE 4 announcement HAVE A GOOD FALL BREAK The Daily Tar Heel office will close at 5 p.m. today for Fall Break and will open again at 8 a.m. Monday. The normal publication schedule also will resume Monday. Serving the students and the University community since 1893 www.dailytarheelxom BY KELLY GIEDRAITIS AND KEVIN KILEY SENIOR WRITERS The chancellor search committee decided Tuesday to pursue a contract with R. William Funk & Associates to assist in the search for candidates. Bill Funk, the firm’s head consultant, will aid in recruiting potential candi dates and oversee the process of selecting three nominees to be presented to UNC system President Erskine Bowles. At Tuesday’s meeting, the com mittee also heard proposals from Shelly Storbeck of Storbeck/Pimentel & Associates and John Dißiaggio of Academic Search Inc. Committee members cited Funk’s experience with academic searches as DTH/DANIEL VAN NIEKERK Karen Rosner discusses Jason Ray’s organ donations before a screening of the ESPN show *E:6O,' which featured a segment on Ray. online PHOTO SUBMISSIONS Send in photos from the N.C. State Fair by 5 p.m. Sunday for online publication to Online Editor Nicole Norfleet. an important factor in their decision. “I think he’s the only one of the three that can get every possible candidate to take his phone call,” said Roger Perry, chairman of the Board of TVustees and vice chairman of the committee. Funk has conducted more than 250 searches in the past 25 years. His firm has led multiple searches for public research institutions, including the University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “I have a strong feeling that I’m exactly the right person for you,” Funk said in his presentation. He also is working on a president search at Indiana State University and for the University of California system. the Advanced Coexistence Program. The rest goes to his mother in Rocky Mount. “She is the most amazing person I have ever met in my life,” he said. “She is the only person that when I think of I come to tears.” Mallah’s mother has no health insurance, and his youngest sister, who is in middle school, was recently diagnosed with the rare disease myasthenia gravis, which causes severe muscle weakness and fatigue. Mallah’s family moved to Chapel Hill from Kuwait in 1991 as refugees with only SSOO and the clothes on their backs. His father spoke five languages, had a master’s degree and was an electrical engineer. He was unable to find a job in his field Committee Chairman Nelson Schwab cited Funk’s accessibility as another major strength. “In the past month of communicating with the firms, Bill has been the most responsive,” he said. Funk said that he would like to be personally involved in each step of the process and that he, not his associates, is primarily responsible for running searches like UNC’s. “When you have a question about the search, I will be able to answer it,” he said. Committee members said they looked for candidates who showed dedication to serving UNC. Funk said, if picked, he would spend time on campus to learn about UNC. SEE SEARCH FIRM, PAGE 4 and was then rejected from many jobs for being overqualified. Mallah’s father eventually bought a convenience store in Rocky Mount. On Nov. 6,1995, the family was plan ning to take a vacation to Disney World after recently purchasing its first car. But the convenience store was robbed and Mallah’s father was murdered. “About six months after that, my mom realized she had no one to help and was alone with four kids,” he said. “Me, her and one of my sisters went to the store, and I can remember my mother taking a pail and bucket of Clorox and wiping Dad’s blood off the tiles.” SEE T-SHWTS, PAGE-4 Insanity hard to assess both medically, legally BY CATARINA SARAIVA ASSISTANT CITY EDITOR Mohammad Taheri-Azar has frequently flip-flopped in his pub lic behavior and legal decisions since driving an SUV through the Pit in March 2006, injuring nine. Last week his public defender, James Williams, notified the court that Taheri-Azar, a 2005 UNC grad uate who majored in psychology and philosophy, would plead not guilty by reason of insanity —a rarely used defense that’s difficult to prove. Jim Woodall, district attorney for Orange and Chatham counties, said the only case in almost 18 years that he can recall that made successful use of the insanity defense was that this day in history OCT. 17,1982... UNC announces the beginning of a licensing program to control the use of University logos and symbols on apparel and other merchandise. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 17, 2007 I^*ll | Sunday. For a list of ? the modified sched- 1 uies, see page 5. UNC campus to host forum Local candidates come to students BY JESSIE ROSS STAFF WRITER Campus leaders plan to bring candidates running for local office closer to students next week. The UNC student government will host a forum for candidates running for Chapel Hill and Carrboro municipal offices at 7 p.m. Oct. 24 in Wilson 107- The forum comes after the inactivity of Vote Carolina on campus this year, said Rea Grainger, stu dent govern ment town rela tions committee chairman. Chapel Hill Town Council incumbent Bill Mrfiicipal 1 election \VyOO7 INSIDE Some students got incorrect voter registra tion forms. PAGE 3 Strom said he attended a similar forum in 2003 hosted by The Daily Tar Heel in conjunction with other campus organizations and found it extremely successful. This year’s forum will begin with a panel in which candidates will introduce themselves and briefly explain their election platform. The town relations committee has prepared several “questions that we consider pertinent,” said Ashley Harrington, the committee’s vice chairwoman. After the committee’s questions, the forum will be open to questions from students. The blog OrangePolitics.org chronicled frustrations with forums in 2003, including several posts by incumbent candidate Cam Hill. Hill will be attending this year’s SEE UNC FORUM, PAGE 4 Mohammad Taheri-Azar is pleading not guilty due to insanity in 18 felony charges in the Pit attack. of Wendell Williamson. Williamson, a third-year UNC Law student at the time, killed two people in a shooting spree on Henderson Street in 1995. Williamson was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia before the shootings but was taken off his SEE TAHERI-AZAR, PAGE 4 weather Partly cloudy index HB3ltl police log 2 calendar 2 sports "" 7 games 7 opinion 8
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