The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current, October 28, 1993, Image 1
October 28, 1993 University of Nebraska-Lincoln Vol. 93 No. 48 Thursday $0/25 Blustery and turning cold today. Friday, continued cold, highs in the 30‘s Still Perfect The Nebraska volleyball team defeated Kansas State for the 47th time in 47 tries Wednesday night. Page 7 Sleepout s value to homeless in question By Paula Lavigne Staff Reporter Some Lincoln residents will sleep out Friday to raise money for the city’s estimated 3,000 home less, but critics of the event would ratherpeople with homes stayed there. The Great Plains Winter Sleepout, which will start Friday at 6 p.m. and end Saturday at 7 a.m. at Centennial Mall, is sponsored by the Lincoln/ Lancaster County Homeless Coali tion. Steve Janovec, executive director of the Peoples City Mission and chair man of the sleepout’s steering com mittee, said the event offered “a very, very, small taste of what it’s like being homeless.” But Rev. Andy Hird of All Souls Non-Denominational Church and Street Missionary said he thought the sleepout would only distort the homelessness problem. “The sleepout doesn’t really talk about the severity and dangers of homelessness and how we can eradi cate it,” Hird said. “It seems more like a fun event or party.” Because of this, Hird, along with members of Humanity Plus, a newly formed organization striving to “fight injustice against humanity,” plan to protest the sleepout. Hird, founder of Humanity Plus, said his organization opposed the event because it exploited homeless people by falsely portraying the prob lem. The group’s protest will be a silent demonstration from 6 p.m. to mid night Friday at 15th and N streets. Hird said he expected about 50 people to attend. “We’re going to hold up signs,” Hird said. “We’re doing itbecause we felt it was necessary to really educate people about the homeless.” But Janovec said he thought the sleepout would help, not harm, the homeless. “Obviously, I disagree that it ex ploits homelessness,” he said. Janovec said although some of the events would be enjoyable, the sleepout’s primary purpose was to educate the public and to raise sup port. “The goal of this is not to have fun or be entertained,” he said. “But rais ing funds for the homeless doesn’t have to mean sour faces.” Janovec said participants would be role-playing and acting out situations that contributed to homelessness. Or ganizers also have planned musical performances, speakers from home less organizations and speeches by people who are homeless. Janovec said the program could still be enjoyable for the expected 1,000 participants while providing a See SLEEPOUT on 2 Old building once hosted musical ghost, professor says Editor's Note: This story is part of a Hallow een week series about Lincoln's ghost sto ries. By Jeffrey Robb Staff Reporter _ Thirty years ago, Nebraska Wesleyan Uni versity’s Academic Dean Sam Dahl was the first to hear that his secretary, Coleen Buterbaugh, had seen a ghost. He never discounted the story. Nor do many people on the Wesleyan cam pus, Mary Smith, a NWU English professor, said. The school seems to have accept ed that the campus may have a ghost, Smith said. Smith is one of the hand ful of current faculty mem bers who was around on Oct. 3, 1963. She has become Wesleyan’s resident ghost story teller. Smith said one story in particular—the one about Clara Mills — has carved a niche in Nebraska Wesleyan’s campus tradition. The ghost is so popular she even has a room on campus named after her. Smith recounts the following story about mius. The story began in 1912, when Mills came to work in Wesleyan’s music department. Mills’ office was in the C.C. White Building. Smith said the C.C. White Building fit the image of a haunted house. The construction passed through many stages, she said, and architectural stylesdid not match. This gave the building a disjointed sense. She said construction glitches led to howling sounds rushing down the halls when an east wind blew, further adding to its mystique. The building stayed open all night, Smith said, because it was used primarily by music students who had no other time to practice. A number of strange occurrences took place in the building, but no one paid much attention to them until April 1940. One spring morning, Mills was found in her office, dead of an apparent heart attack. The death made the already strange building even more frightening. But for more than 20 years, nothing unusual happened in the C.C. White Building — until Oct. 3, 1963. According to Alan Boye’s book “A Guide to the Ghosts of Lincoln,’* that was the day Coleen Buterbaugh opened an office door and felt a deathly stillness and a strange presence. Boye wrote that Buterbaugh turned and saw a ghostly apparition to her nght. Through the window, instead of the buildings that should have been visible, Buterbaugh saw a scene from the past. She ran from the room to tell her boss what happened. Smith'said within hours everybody on cam pus had heard the story. By noon, residence hall counselors were cal led to Dahl ’ s office and told to keep the story quiet. The story may have seemed preposterous at first, Smith said, but Dahl believed it. Some time later, Buterbaugh was shown a Wesleyan yearbook and identified Clara Mills as the See WESLEYAN on 6 Gerik Parmete/DN Winding up UNL heptathlete Michelle Shoemaker prepares to throw a shot put at Weir Track on Wednesday afternoon. Trial video details Harms’ grave site By Steve Smith Senior Reporter Prosecutors presented image after grisly image Wednesday as they attempted to build a foundation of evidence to con vict Roger Bjorklund in the 1992 slaying of a University of Nebraska-Lincoln student. Roger BJorkkmd uepuiy county Attorney John Colbom showed ju rors photographs and a videotape re cording of Candice Harms’ remains, (which were found in a shallow grave south of Lincoln, k The 31-year-old Bjorklund faces first-degree murder charges in the September 1992 slaying of UNL freshman Harms, 18, of Lincoln. As Colbom played the videotape, which detailed the area around the grave site and Harms’ remains, at least six observers were compelled to leave the courtroom. Bjorklund, who was dressed in a black shirt, blue jeans and white tennis shoes, scribbled on a notepad and showed little interest while jurors watched the tape. Colbom entered into evidence the videotape as well as several photos from Dec. 6, when authorities searched the shallow grave near 134th Street and Yankee Hill Road. Lancaster County District Judge Donald Endacott allowed the tape and the pictures into evidence despite several objections from Bjorklund’s attorney, Chief Deputy Public Defender Scott Helvie. Helvie said several of the photographs were irrelevant to the case. He said the amount of time the court would have to devote to the numerous pictures also would deprive Bjorklund of due process. Endacott ruled Tuesday prosecutors could use only 15 of 50 photographs they had submit ted. The photographs included those taken at Harms’ autopsy and when her body was recov ered.~7~ Scott Barney, the other man charged in Harms’ murder, led police to a shallow grave containing Harms’ body on Dec. 6. Barney agreed to work with authorities so that the death penalty would not be sought against him. Prosecutors have said they would seek the death penalty against Bjorklund if he was con victed. See TRIAL on 6 News of UNL assault travels to Malaysia By Alan Phelps Senior Reporter News about the on-campus assault of a Malaysian student apparently is giving UNL a bad name in his home country. Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs James Griesen said several Malaysian students had told him of the incident’s news coverage in Malaysia. “The news accounts did not make UNL look good," Griesen said. Especially in the wake of widely-reported tourist shootings in Florida, Griesen said, re ports of the assault could lead Malaysians to believe the University of Nebraska-Lincoln is a violent place. “It makes people nervous,” he said. Boon-Chung Ong, a UNL student from Malaysia, was assaulted Oct. 17 in Broyhill Plaza. Police are continuing their investigation into the incident. On Tuesday, a male juvenile was arrested in Omaha for third-degree assault. Cheow Teong Oh, president of the Malay sian Student Association, said he had heard from relatives back home that almost every newspaper in Malaysia carried a story about the assault. He said Malaysians took the news very seriously. “They worry and do not feel safe about their children here,” he said. Oh said most of the articles probably origi nated from Associated Press reports. Translat ing the story into the several languages spoken in Malaysia — such as Chinese ana Malay — may have distorted the news, he said, making the situation seem worse. Many Malaysians, Oh said, thought the as sault was racially motivated because witnesses said the perpetrators were black men. Oh said he recently was contacted by a Malaysian re porter asking questions about the assault. “I tried to explain to him this is not racism,” Oh said. Oh said Malaysian students planned to send letters and local newspaper articles about the assault to Malaysian colleges and media to try to set the record straight. ‘‘We are trying to do our best to convince everybody this is a safe place,” he said. Griesen also said UNL was a safe place to go to school. However, he said, saying someplace is good and safe doesn’t grab headlines as much as assaults do. Griesen said he and International Affairs officials would send information Jo Malaysian colleges that have sent students to Nebraska. ‘‘We want to make sure the whole story is out,” Griesen said. “It was an unfortunate act of random violence,”