ILLINOIS — Southern Illinois University’s student newspaper,the Daily Egyptian, has been subject to repeated vandalismthrough the appearance of racist stickers and fliers in selectedissues of its paper.
The latest incident happened Sept. 7 when white supremaciststickers and fliers were found in copies of the paper, campuspolice said. The first occurrence was on June 5, involving approximately100 copies found at various locations throughout the campus.
Similar incidents occurred on the mornings of July 10 and 18,when 150 copies of the newspaper were tampered with, campus policesaid. The majority of the papers vandalized in all the incidentswere found in the university’s student center, although some werelocated in other buildings around campus.
Similar white supremacist stickers had been posted in the studentcenter in the past, prior to the newspaper incidents. Police wouldnot comment as to whether the same people were responsible forthe acts, according to a Daily Egyptian article.
"Similar stickers have also been appearing on variouslight polls and places throughout campus," said campus policeLt. Todd Sigler.
Lance Speere, acting general manager and news editorial adviser,said the stickers and fliers carry messages from the NationalAlliance based in Hillsboro, W.Va. One sticker suggests that "thewhite race" is "earth’s most endangered species."
Even though the National Alliance’s name appeared on the postcard-sizedstickers and inserts, campus police said they are not aware oflocal members who might be responsible for the vandalism or couldhave ties to campus.
Sigler declined to comment on possible suspects while the incidentremains under investigation.
The Daily Egyptian estimates its financial loss is morethan $4,500, about the cost of placing an insert in a single issueof the paper, Speere said. Since some copies had stickers affixedto pages, those newspapers had to be thrown away. Speere saidthe additional loss was about 50 cents per paper, the cost ittakes to produce each copy.
Speere said that if the advertising department had been approachedby the vandals about paying for a flier to be distributed withthe paper that a review committee consisting of students wouldhave determined whether or not to let the fliers be distributed.
"A committee of students would review any controversialads for the paper," Speere said. " I don’t know if thestudents would have let it run or not."
An example of one of the stickers found on the Daily Egyptianis available at: http://www.natvan.com/cgi-bin/webc.cgi/st_prod.html?p_prodid=624&p_catid=18&Copies of the fliers are located at: http://www.natvan.com/leaflets