Friday

February 13, 1998

Campus biologist dies at 59

Flies and students filled Cal Dorsey's 24 years as an instructional support technician at CSUS, his wife, Judy, said following his death in the Science Building Wednesday. He was 59.

"That was his love," Mrs. Dorsey said Thursday. "Flies were his thing ... It was a standing joke, especially in the family."

The cause of death had not been determined at press time.

But as much as he loved his job, Cal had an appointment this week to discuss his retirement from his position as in the biological sciences department.

"He loved the people he interfaced with," Mrs. Dorsey said of her husband, who was known campus-wide. "He was well-liked."

According to his wife, Cal was as gentle as a lamb.

"But he could roar like a lion," she recalled.

Cal had a way about him, she said, one that allowed him to answer question after question if it would help a student. "He was willing to go a little farther."

Cal Dorsey graduated from CSUS in the early 1970s with a bachelor's degree in biological sciences. He also served in the Air Force as a medic. Since then, he had lived in Sacramento.

After Cal graduated, his wife said, he loved to travel.

In fact, the couple were planning a trip from Sacramento to Chicago, and then onto Louisiana and Las Vegas in the near future.

She remembered their vacations were always centered around school -- and flies.

"'We've got to get back by a certain time! The plane! The plane! The flies! The flies!' he always said," said Mrs. Dorsey, imitating her husband's impression of Tattoo from television's "Fantasy Island."

He spent many nights in the lab, setting up the fly specimens.

Cal, his wife recalls, was also an avid pool player, and had told her he met a new friend on Tuesday. When he did not come home that night, she figured the two were out shooting a few racks. Or, she figured, maybe he was in the labs.

After a few hours passed, she filed a missing persons report with the police. Around 5 a.m., she sent her son in search of Cal's car at CSUS. When her son found the car he called University Police.

At 6:30 a.m., police officers found Cal Dorsey dead in his office, looking relaxed -- with his feet up on his desk.

He had suffered a heart attack Dec. 23, according to Ms. Dorsey, and was also a diabetic. In fact, he had only recently felt well enough to return to work.

He had an appointment with his doctor at 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday, but never showed. "That wasn't like Cal," Ms. Dorsey said.

Reaction from those in the biological sciences department was filled with emotion. "Judy said he died at the place he loved," said Laurel Heffernan, chair of the biological sciences department. "He was a kind, gentle person. He was always willing to help in any way he could for the students."

According to Heffernan, he worked with his fruit flies for the genetics section of the department and for freshman biology courses. Cal, who began his career at CSUS in 1973, was also quite active in physiology courses.

Cal Dorsey's main partner in crime, according to Mrs. Dorsey, was Jana Shober, also an instructional support technician in biological sciences.

Shober knew Cal for 19 years. During three of those years, he was Shober's mentor.

"Cal helped me tremendously as a student," said Shober. "He was very knowledgeable ... Cal was a wonderful teacher.

"Our relationship later, as colleagues, was as good as you could wish for," she said. "He will never be replaced. There was only one of him. He'll be missed very much."

Shober added that while in his room today, searching for something, she felt him "coming back." She said Cal being gone "just doesn't seem real yet. It hurts very much not to have him here with us."

Another technician, James Tilley, knew Cal for 24 years. He said his colleague's personality was encouraging and warm.

"He never had anything bad to say about anybody. We spent a lot of time together," said Tilley. "He gave his all. When he was interviewing for the job, we struck it off. We're going to miss him a lot."

Students who want to write something in memory of Cal may do so at the biological sciences department office in the Science Building, room 202.

The department is waiting for the family's word on any memorial before planning its own.

This is the second person affiliated with the department to die in the past month. University spokeswoman Ann Reed said that on Jan. 27, Miklos Udvardy, a faculty member, also died.

Computer thefts rampant at CSUS

As many as 11 computers have been stolen from CSUS since October, according to campus police, and six of the thefts happened during winter break.

The thefts have occurred in buildings throughout the campus -- art, speech/drama, physical education, business, temporary GG, engineering, facilities management and science.

"From time to time we have computers stolen from the campus," said campus police investigator John Hamrick, "especially during breaks when fewer people are on campus."

The hardest hit was the physical education department, which had one computer stolen from the Hornet Athletic Foundation office in early December and two more taken from the director's office during the last weekend of January. The second theft left Athletics Director Judith Davidson and her administrative assistant, Nicole Lynn, without computers as the spring semester began.

In both thefts, thieves cut through the security cords on the computers. Also stolen from the athletics department were two printers, a variety of briefcases and a Dictaphone.

A thief apparently entered the art building through a window, as well, according to department Chairman John Driesbach. In October, a faculty member came in on a weekend and found a computer missing from a fellow faculty member's office.

"The office had a casement window that did not lock properly," Driesbach said. "It must have been a pretty skinny person to fit through the window."

The business management department hasn't yet replaced a computer that was stolen in December, according to department Chairman Laurence Takeuchi. He discovered a lap top missing from a store room in the business building on the last day of the fall semester.

"The store room is always locked and there is other hardware in there. The lap top was the only one unaccounted for," Takeuchi said.

In January, Facilities Management got something in return when it had a computer stolen. "Someone took a computer from the carpenter's shop and left one of lesser capacity," said Howard Harris of Facilities Management.

CSU insurance policy leaves many campus theft victims in the cold

A rash of computer thefts here at CSUS have left many uninsured departments without funds to provide replacements, leaving them to fend for themselves.

The departments of athletics, art, business, science, theater -- even the State Hornet -- have all been victims of such crimes.

"The CSU system offers an optional insurance policy which covers stolen equipment," said Ronald Grant, director of support services. "Most departments have no insurance budgeted at all."

Campus administrators reason it is better to take a loss rather than have property insured.

"If it is a vital piece of equipment, there should be money in the system somewhere to pay for it or budget it for next year," Grant said.

The CSU system views its method of placing the responsibility for insurance on the departments as cost effective, since the departments don't have enough room in their budgets to pay for coverage. This saves the CSU system the price of premiums.

According to Grant, the university insures itself for liability only, through an insurance pool.Among department chairs contacted by the State Hornet, consensus was financial restraints leave them with few options.

Strapped for money, departments prefer to target their limited funding toward supplies, equipment and instructors, rather then pay for insurance premiums.

"Ultimately we have to replace the missing unit," said Associate Dean Paul Noble, from the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics. "There's not much flexibility to do any buying right now. We're not able to buy without a tradeoff."

Sometimes, due to the lack of money for purchasing additional equipment, department staff must come up with innovative ways for replacing the stolen items. Some borrow equipment from other departments on campus while others even bring in their own systems from home.

The athletic department, for instance, found temporary replacements for a stolen tower processor and a Laserjet printer.

"We have a loaner from the computer center until we can get another from next year's budget," said Nichole Lynn, athletics department administrative assistant.

The chair of the theater arts department came to the rescue for one of his staff when he personally replaced a stolen Macintosh system.

"I gave the department assistant an old system I had at home to use, so the one they were using could be used by the faculty member. This is a bad situation, having no insurance, but we're stuck with it," said Dean Busick.

Virus threat only a hoax

By NATHAN WALLS
HORNET STAFF WRITER

The threat of a virus erasing months, or even years, worth of work is enough to give any computer user nightmares.

Recent e-mail messages, including one sent into the Geology Club ListProc -- an e-mail discussion group -- have contained warnings stating that by reading a particular e-mail, a user's hard drive could be irreversibly corrupted. The warning goes on to explain drastic steps necessary to quickly avert disaster and then directs the user to send copies to friends.

These messages of corrupted computers via e-mail are a hoax, says Jason Grove, a SacLink help desk staffer.

"There is no such thing as an e-mail virus. You can send viruses with e-mail, as an attachment, but you would have to run it." Grove said.

However, users should be cautious of anything that proclaims a virus can simply be loaded onto a local computer by reading a particular e-mail, Grove said.

There are viruses that can be attached as files, but those require separate downloading.

One example is "AOL for free." The user is enticed in the message e-mail to open the attached "AOL" software which frees the virus to enter the local computer.

Grove said e-mail attachments must be manually opened by the user, and that SacLink does not distribute or support software than auto opens file attachments, as some companies have done in the past.

Virus hoaxes named "Join the Crew," and "Naughty Robot," are two of several circulating the internet. "Naughty Robot" informs users their Internet accounts have been hacked and their credit card and phone numbers are in the hands of criminals. The message, crafted to look it comes from a system administrator, urges recipients to cancel their credit cards and disconnect their phones.

"Join the Crew," recently made the rounds on the Geology club's e-mail discussion group.

Justin Ferguson, also a SacLink help desk staffer, said he has seen "Join the Crew" going around the internet for the past three years.

Crafty wording of the messages often confuses users of the authority of the document, Grove said. "Join the Crew" for example, said IBM and AOL had made announcements warning of the viruses danger.

IBM responded to the hoax, saying that simply opening e-mail does not endanger a user, but opening unknown software might.

Computer users can also face getting viruses through open computer labs with several users bringing in diskettes, Ferguson said. One user can bring in an infected disk, the virus crashes the computer's operating system, and the user is left with a computer that won't retrieve a valuable report. So, the user takes the disk out and goes to the next computer. The virus tags along.

"You are more likely to get a computer virus in one hour of computer lab use than over a year of surfing the net," said Rex Schrader, a CSUS student who operates a computer consulting business with his father. "The primary thing would be to scan a disk for viruses used in a computer lab before using it on a home computer. "

Preventing real virus infections, Grove said, is easy. Buying a copy of commercial anti-virus software such as Norton AntiVirus or McAfee VirusScan will ensure both hard drives and removable volumes either a diskette or larger media, such as a Zip disk, is clean.

"You can't stop getting a virus, but you can stop it from doing damage by catching it quickly," Schrader said.

E-mail virus questions?

Internet users can check out virus outbreaks for reality or hype at http://www.av.ibm.com/BreakingNews/, or at http://fedcirc.llnl.gov/viruses.

ASI passes election codes after long debate

Following a lengthy debate Wednesday, the Associated Students Inc. board of directors voted unanimously to accept several changes and clarification to the ASI election code.

Changes to the code were proposed last fall following the widely debated spring 1997 presidential elections which resulted in the disqualification of popular vote winner Gary Davis, and awarded incumbent Sandra Schlemmer the presidency.

One of the key changes was the implementation of specific punishments that may be used by the election complaint committee to reprimand candidates convicted of minor campaign violations. The committee may now respond by drafting a letter to the candidate citing the offense, which would also be sent to the State Hornet for possible publication. There could also be a fine imposed of up to $50, with all money going to the Tanton Memorial Scholarship fund, on the candidate.

A question of the legality of imposing a monetary fine was raised, but according to ASI Executive Director Carol Ackerson, such an act is legal.

"If it is clear (to the candidate) before hand, it appears there are ways we can go about that." Ackerson said.

The codes also specify the order of succession that would apply if a president-elect were to be disqualified -- as in the situation that occurred last year.

The codes specify that the executive vice president shall assume the duties of president until a decision is reached by either the election complaint committee or the appellate council.

"I think we passed a document that puts students first," said Jennifer Helms, chair of the election code task force. "I think we have a great finished product."

The largest debate resulted from the proposed amendment to clarify the qualifications necessary for students to serve on the board. Board members locked horns over specific GPA requirements that they deemed necessary for service.

Brian Cooley, executive director for university affairs asked that the board consider only the board members overall GPA.

"When you apply to law school, they ask you what your GPA was. Not your GPA in the spring of '98 or the fall of '97," Cooley said.

Kim Shaw, director for natural science and mathematics, was concerned that students who had trouble the last semester may find the demands of board service too harsh.

"This takes a lot of time, and I don't think we should be allowing students on (the board) who are having problems so that their GPA's can go farther down," Shaw said.

Despite several attempts by Schlemmer, who favored a stricter interpretation of GPA, she was not able to gain the majority vote, and was forced to table the issue until the next meeting.

The board also voted to place an amendment to the operating rules on the spring ballot for student approval. The amendment to operating rule 200.2.B would allow the president to determine the most effective means to advertise vacant director positions, by mass mailings or through campus publications.

Finally, the board accepted this springs election timeline. Interested candidates may begin picking up packets Feb. 23.

Communication studies dept. forms new honor society chapter

The CSUS communication department was honored with its own chapter of Lambda Pi Eta, a national undergraduate communication honor society, that spans 36 states and contains 144 chapters.

Marlene M. von Friederichs-Fitzwater, communication studies chair at CSUS, Jolene Koester, vice president of academic affairs at CSUS, Christina Mendonsa, Channel 10 news anchor, and Pilar Montoya, owner of Montoya Bilingual Communications, were the selected honorary members, initiated into Epsilon Phi, the new chapter, Dec. 12.

"We were chosen because of the work we have done in our discipline and the contributions that we have continued to make to our discipline," Fitzwater said.

David P. Milton, the chapters current president and one of Epsilon Phi's president, believes the society has the potential to increase its student numbers, once invitations are received by qualifying communication majors.

"Out of 1,200 current communication majors only 35 qualified the first time around ... I believe we have the potential to probably double the membership ... if a student studies well, studies hard and studies smart they'll make the chapter," said Milton.

According to Fitzwater, the invitations are currently being mailed out and are based on students most recent academic records.

To qualify for membership students need a 3.0 cumulative G.P.A., a minimum G.P.A. of 3.25 within their major and completion of 60 semester hours, 12 of which must be within their major.

The term Lambda Pi Eta, which was borrowed from Artistotle's Rhetoric, translates into logic, emotion and credibility.

These three words are driving Milton's plans and organization of the chapter.

"Whatever I do, with the organization, it has to be the best for the membership and the continued growth of the chapter," said Milton. "We are sitting on the first year of a 100 year tradition...my goal is to start this tradition with some suggestions and ideas that will not become outdated."

Among Milton's ideas is a mentoring program that will consist of aiding high-risk students at local grade schools.

Milton plans to further increase the organization's membership by offering educational aid to students who are just below the societies qualifying criteria and by creating financial aid programs for students who are experiencing difficulties with the cost of school or the society, which has a $20 annual fee.

Milton's financial aid program will consist of asking alumni to sponsor students in the society. Lambda Pi Eta was established in 1985 at the University of Arkansas and is the official national student honorary for communication majors. The society is also a member of the Association of College Honor societies.

For more information call the CSUS communication studies department at 278-6688.

POLICE LOG:

THURSDAY, JAN. 29
HAZARD TO LIFE/PROPERTY: A tree fell on power lines off campus and live wires were exposed on the ground. SMUD and the fire department were notified.
SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCE: Three men were hanging around the railroad tracks and watching Lot 10.
PETTY THEFT: A backpack was taken from the Bookstore.
PETTY THEFT: A wallet was taken from the computer lab in the Library.
VEHICLE STOP: Man was arrested for drunk driving and evading arrest.

FRIDAY, JAN. 30
SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCE: A homeless man frightened a custodian at the back of the Speech/Drama Building near Burger King.
AUTO BURGLARY: The driver's side door lock was punched in Lot 2. A parking pass, an Alpine stereo and a pair of speakers were taken.
PETTY THEFT: A backpack containing textbooks was taken from the Bookstore.
HIT AND RUN: A car was damaged in the Public Safety lot and a note was left with a fake number.
BURGLARY: The outside paneling of the Facilities Management warehouse was peeled back, but no one was able get in. Spray paint graffiti was found nearby.
SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCE: A suspicious man was near the Speech/Drama Building.
SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCE: A suspicious man was wandering in the Library. He was gone when Public Safety arrived.
PETTY THEFT: A backpack containing a driver's license, wallet, cell phone and miscellaneous items was taken from the Bookstore, valuing $435.
PETTY THEFT: A backpack containing three textbooks and miscellaneous items were taken from the bookstore, valuing $290.

SATURDAY, JAN. 31
SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCE: Two men tried to get in the outside doors of Mendocino Hall.

SUNDAY, FEB. 1
SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCE: A man was scared of two boys acting suspicious in Lot 1. He called Public Safety, but the boys were gone.
SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCE: A man was trying to get into inside doors in the Speech/Drama Building.

MONDAY, FEB. 2
BURGLARY: The Coke and candy machines in the Psychology Building were broken into.
AUTO THEFT: A midnight blue 1984 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme was taken from the Residence Hall parking lot between 2:30 a.m Saturday and 6:30 a.m. Sunday. It was later recovered by the Highway Patrol.
INDECENT EXPOSURE: A man entered the study cubicle in the reserve book area of the Library and exposed himself to a female student. He was arrested for indecent exposure.
WELFARE CHECK: A man fell in front of Sacramento Hall while running to catch the bus. He was taken to the Student Health Center.
TRAFFIC ACCIDENT: Car accident in front of the Children's Center on State University Drive. No injuries were reported.
PETTY THEFT: A wallet was taken from the Student Union, valued at $16.
HAZARD TO LIFE/PROPERTY: A tire went flat after hitting a pothole on State University Drive in front of the Public Safety Building.
FALSE ALARM: A fire alarm was pulled on the second floor of Mendocino Hall. A bottle was used to break the glass and the amount of damage is unknown.

TUESDAY, FEB. 3
SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCE: Three men were seen snooping around cars in Lot 4.
TRAFFIC ACCIDENT: A Facilities Management car was involved in an accident. One party complained of a headache.
INCIDENT: An elderly man slipped and fell on a wet floor in Mendocino Hall.
TRAFFIC ACCIDENT: A bicycle and car were involved in an accident in front of the bookstore. No injuries were reported.
HARASSMENT: A male student was spotted by his ex-girlfriend on campus and she began yelling and pushing him. She was advised not to disturb him.
AUTO THEFT: A white 1984 Toyota truck was stolen from the parking structure.
VIOLATION OF RESTRAINING ORDER: There was a report of violation of a restraining order, but there was no order on file.
PETTY THEFT: A woman left a cellular phone in the women's restroom on the second floor of Mendocino Hall. When she went back to retrieve it, it was gone.

WEDNESDAY, FEB. 4
Times keys locked in car: 5
ESCORT: A woman was escorted from Education building to Jenkins Hall.
DISTURBING THE PEACE: There was an uncooperative student with parking officers in the parking structure.
AUTO BURGLARY: A car in Lot 4 was broken into. There was no sign of forced entry, and a parking decal, cellular phone and CDs were taken.
VEHICLE FIRE: A student's car was smoking in the parking structure. The fire department was on the scene and a tow truck was called.
PETTY THEFT: A shoulder bag was taken from the cubicle in the bookstore containing textbooks, school supplies and keys.
HIT & RUN: A car was damaged in the 30 minute parking space in Lot A.
PETTY THEFT: A backpack containing miscellaneous items was taken and a suspicious man was seen in the area.
NOISE COMPLAINT: Drummers in the parking structure were disturbing a professor teaching a class. The drummers were asked to move to a higher level.
PETTY THEFT: A purse containing a wallet, driver's license and $6 was taken from the Riverfront Center.