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Alestle
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Thursday, March 14, 2013
www.alestlelive.com
Volume 65, No. 25
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Student Government candidates address goals, issues
The 2013-2014 Student Government candidates talked about several campus issues they would like to address if elected at two open forums Tuesday in the Goshen Lounge. Even though only three candidates were at the morning session due to scheduling conflicts, half of the candidates were at the afternoon
open forum ready to answer questions about their upcoming candidacy. The presidential candidate, Alexa Hillery, and both student trustee candidates, Nick Mehner and Tyler Urish, were absent from both sessions. At the start of each session, the candidates were given a chance to introduce themselves and offer a statement to the audience. The statements included why they should be
elected to what they would like to accomplish. Vice presidential candidate Nasir Almasri, currently the organizations relations officer, used his opening statement to address the current tensions between students and Parking Services. “One of my initiatives is to reduce the friction. I feel like there’s a real friction between students and Parking Services,” Almasri said. “We hear it over and over and over again.
I do not drive myself, but hearing this over and over and over again has really drawn me to this issue. Whatever route we need to take to lessen that friction for both Parking Services and students, I think those actions need to be taken.” Senate candidates Quinn Vaughn and Madeline McCune also talked about the parking issues on campus, but they suggested a parking garage rather than another lot. “I hope to implement a parking
lot or a parking structure because we seem to be the only campus without one,” Vaughn said. “I also want to improve some parking systems, like implement some lights on campus.” Senate candidates Ryan Murray and Sean Maher are hoping to gain votes for a 2013-2014 position by promising to try to make SIUE feel less like a junior college and more like a four-year university. | pg. 6
Illinois appeals court Making an oppression overturns former SIUE student’s 2011 sentence
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Former SIUE student Olutosin Oduwole, convicted of attempting to make a terrorist threat, has had the decision overturned by an Illinois appeals court. In 2011, a jury found him guilty of making a terrorist threat, a class 1 felony, and of unauthorized possession or storage of a weapon in a public building, a class A misdemeanor. Oduwole’s sentence was originally five years in prison for the felony, a concur- '/.*-%) rent term of 364 days and $1,000 fine for the %"$#' misdemeanor. He was sentenced in December 2011 and began his sentence on Jan. 4, 2012. As of Monday, he is still incarcerated in the Jacksonville Correctional Center. Oduwole, an aspiring rapper, appealed the 2011 felony conviction on the grounds that the evidence is not sufficient enough to
sustain the conviction. The 5th District Appellate Court in Mount Vernon disagreed with the jury of the original case. The court said Oduwole did not take a substantial step in communicating a threat. According to the court’s ruling, the “cited acts do not place the defendant in dangerous proximity to success.” “On the continuum between preparation and perpetration, the acts cited by the State hover much closer to preparation,” the court’s ruling said. The ruling also said there was no evidence Oduwole had /1*'! targeted a person or group he intended to threaten. “In the absence of sufficient evidence that the defendant had taken a substantial step toward making a terrorist threat,” the ruling said, “his writings, as abhorrent as they may be, amount to mere thoughts.” According to Stephanee Smith, communications director | pg. 6