Police break up fraternity parties

Police stopped parties at Pi Kappa Alpha, Sigma Alpha Epsilon, Alpha Tau Omega and Sigma Chi Friday night.

In addition to the 38 minor consuming alcohol violations, police cited a 14-year-old boy for drinking and cited three UA students for drinking in public, two for possession of marijuana and four for giving false information to a police officer, police sai d.

The fraternity hardest hit was Pi Kappa Alpha, which was shut down about 10:30 p.m., after police found five 16- to-17 year-old boys with Keystone Lights in their hands.

It was determined that alcohol was too accessible to minors at the party, prompting police to cite house President Doug Lipsky with a criminal charge of allowing minors to consume alcohol, police said. The fraternity could face fines from $10,000 to $20, 000. Lipsky's court date is Oct. 3.

Two of the boys had been stamped as legal age by the private security hired to control the party.

"Those boys should've been challenged at the door," said University Police Chief Harry Hueston, "They were obviously underage."

However, Lipsky said he believes the responsibility of detecting underage drinkers falls on the security company the house hired to run the door.

"That's why we hired them," said Lipsky, a political science junior.

Although hired security checks identification, each house is required to have a member at the door the entire night, said Chris Sandell, chair of Greeks Advocating Mature Management of Alcohol.

GAMMA is a student peer monitoring group, with representatives from each Greek chapter, that visits parties to ensure the group's rules are followed.

In addition, all of the parties Friday night had members working the bar.

It is up to each fraternity to check for stamps at the bar, otherwise violations will occur, Sandell said.

Lipsky said his fraternity tried to move the bar to a more restricted area after two officers had made an initial check, but he said the party was never given a chance.

"The band never even got going," he said.

Pike was also one of three fraternities that night without police presence, a GAMMA violation. Lipsky said the fraternity filed a police request on Sept. 9, which was too late to be accommodated.

Sigma Chi President Justin Clump voluntarily sent people home after police had quickly located four underage drinkers at the party.

"I felt it was in the best interest of my fraternity to shut down the party," he said, "I had a gut feeling."

Students cautiously attempted to dodge authorities and soon all that was left was about 50 cases of empty Ice House Beer cans and some wilted vegetables.

Despite all the beer cans being the same brand, Clump said his fraternity had practiced the GAMMA rule that requires all 21-and-over partygoers to bring a 12- pack and disallows the fraternity to supply the beer.

Sandell said it was one policy GAMMA has not effectively enforced.

"We will be addressing the issue at the next meeting." he said.

At ATO, Hueston told a member, "We've already got five MIPs and we're not even looking that hard," prompting the fraternity to stop the party.

Police shut down SAE shortly before 1 a.m., but were met with some resistance as the band continued to play for several minutes.

SAE Treasurer Jaime Cohen said his fraternity does its best to regulate drinking at parties, but added some things are out of their control.

"Drunk (people) will take a warm half-empty beer off the wall and start drinking it," Cohen said. "There's not much we can do to stop that."

Although students sometimes have a negative reaction to a high police presence, Hueston said the fact there were no shootings or reported acts of violence Friday night was very positive.

"It's important to keep things in perspective," he said.