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The Rice Thresher
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by Olivia Allison Thresher editorial staff The flat-screen computer display taken from the Humanities Building was part of a jack on Hanszen College, the three people arrested for the burglary of the display said. Christian "Ash" Martinez (Sid '00) and Wiess College seniors Scott Byer and Francisco Padua claim they did not intend to steal the computer equipment from Rice but to use it for a jack on Hanszen. The suspects pleaded not guilty to the charge of burglary at an arraignment Sept. 20. "Theft was never an issue - we were never going to steal anything," Padua said. "The property was never going to leave Rice. We were getting the components for this jack. ... This is a complete misinterpretation of what we intended to do." The suspects said they were unable to comment on the details of the jack until after their meeting with judicial affairs, which will probably be Monday afternoon, acting Assistant Dean for Student Judicial Programs Allen Matusow said. This meeting will determine the university's action against the two Wiess students. Byer said he and Padua plan to cooperate with the university by not talking about the incident until judicial affairs has heard the case. "The administration doesn't want any trouble over this," Byer said. "And we definitely want to work with them in any way we can." Byer said the three did break some parts of the Code of Student Conduct. Although no court date for the grand jury trial has been set, Jay Jackson, the assistant district attorney prosecuting the case, said the trial will probably take place in the next four weeks. Jackson said the grand jury can either indict the suspects or return a "no bill of indictment" verdict, in which case the charges will no longer appear on the suspects' records. Padua and Byer were arrested outside Duncan Hall Sept. 18 after a custodian reported that three suspects leaving Room 226 of the Humanities Building knocked her down after she saw them stealing the monitor. Martinez ran from the officers and was arrested in the garden of a residence north of campus, where a prowler had been reported, about 20 minutes after Padua and Byer's arrest. Padua and Byer said they did not know why Martinez ran from the officers. "We didn't know at this time but Ash has a history ... of running," Byer said. "We just stopped and looked at each other and said, 'What is he doing?' He's an idiot," he said. Another custodian said he saw the students attempting to remove a projector from a room in Duncan Hall shortly after the incident in the Humanities Building. He said he thought he recognized the subjects from an incident a few months ago in Sewall Hall, when he saw people standing on a ladder removing a projector from the ceiling of a classroom. Padua and Byer said the allegation that they had stolen video projectors from Sewall Hall were false. Both said they have never stolen anything from the university. Byer, who is a member of the track and cross country teams, said his coaches will not make a decision in reaction to the incident until they hear judicial affairs' decision.
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