Celebrating 100 years of journalistic integrity
New provost search Committee to begin recruiting potential candidates during summer months
Kieger era ends at MU Women’s basketball coach leaves for same position with Penn State
NEWS, 5
Volume 103, Number 25
SPORTS, 12
Tuesday, April 9, 2019
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GONE WITHOUT ANSWERS
By Matthew Martinez matthew.martinez@marquette.edu Tape recorder in hand, Melvin Spence walked briskly through Marquette’s campus, stopping to question anyone who knew his son. “I know why Jesus Christ died,” Melvin repeated to university officials. “I want to know why Wally died.” Melvin took pictures of the place his son, Walter Spence, fell after jumping from McCormick Hall’s top floor. He photographed his son’s room and roamed through the former residence hall for several hours. Melvin felt that someone at the university was to blame. He thought the circumstances of his son’s April 1978 death were being hidden from him. He originally wanted the university to investigate his son’s death. He was prepared to hand over the information he gathered to university officials, who could then turn it over to civil authorities. But after feeling the university was not thoroughly investigating his son’s death, Melvin informed university officials that he wanted civil authorities to take over the investigation. He believed university officials were complicit in the circumstances of Walter’s death. Melvin thought the Rev. Francis Landwermeyer, S.J., Walter’s former academic adviser, had thrown out items in Walter’s residence hall room that could prove harmful to the university. James H. Scott, then-vice president of student affairs, noted in
LEFT BEHIND PART THREE Illustration by Natallie St. Onge natallie.stonge@marquette.edu
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a memo that Landwermeyer had quickly cleaned clothes left scattered around Walter’s room. “Why L. involved?” Scott asked in his notes. Scott wrote other questions down, including inquiries as to why Walter’s residence hall room wasn’t sealed and fingerprints weren’t taken. Melvin was convinced university officials were involved in a cover-up. No evidence indicated that Walter was pushed out the window. The death was ruled a suicide during the medical examiner’s inquest that same month. “Regardless of who goes to the authorities, the authorities will say ‘OK, we’ll look at it, but unless we come in with new (evidence), we aren’t even going to initiate an investigation looking (into) homicide,’” Scott wrote, referring to words from the university’s legal counsel at the time. Nonetheless, Melvin persisted in his belief that someone had a role in his son’s death. Scott and the university’s legal counsel, meanwhile, conducted meetings with Landwermeyer in which the former adviser told them of the physical discipline he used on Walter. “Think Fr. L is up to his ears,” Scott wrote in a May 11, 1978 handwritten note. Another note made by Scott appears to say, “(Walter) told mother of arm … (Walter told) See LEFT BEHIND pages 2, 3
OPINIONS
NEWS
ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT
Mindfulness in health
Record Store Day event Lowered voting age
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Entertainment, new releases at various stores around city PAGE 8
Political activism demonstrates need for change in requirement PAGE 11