First Amendment group to charge student who deleted posts

The First Amendment Task Force, a student organization, will file charges with the Student Dispute Resolution Center against Wharton and Engineering Senior Matt Kratter today, Task Force Chairperson Eric Tienou announced last night. Kratter will be charged with violating the Student Code of Conduct and the Policy on Ethical Behavior with Respect to the Electronic Information Environment. Kratter, a past chairperson of the Student Committee on Undergraduate Education, deleted newsgroup messages posted by three University students and a University employee early Monday morning. He posted an apology for his actions Tuesday morning, after having previously denied deleting the articles. Kratter's ENIAC account was deactivated at 12:30 a.m. Tuesday morning for unspecified reasons. University officials said Tuesday that they decided not to take disciplinary actions against Kratter. But the Task Force announced that they planned to press charges after several students brought up the issue at their meeting last night. Tienou, a College junior, said the group decided to file a complaint in order to set a precedent against similar events in the future. The first motion at the meeting was for the task force to press charges against Kratter for violating school policy. The second motion "calls on the University to take concrete steps to make sure that this kind of fraudulent censorship never occurs again," Tienou said. The motions were passed unanimously. Tienou said the Task Force is not seeking specific punitive measures. "At this point, it's up to the hearing board," he said. College junior Mike Nadel, a Daily Pennsylvanian columnist and a founding member of the Task Force, said he wants the University to take action. "There are several steps that the University can take to rectify this," he said. "They should stick to their own rules." The electronic mail debate that sparked the deletions concerned the U.S.S Eisenhower -- the first U.S. aircraft carrier to be crewed with both men and women -- on which 15 women allegedly became pregnant. The discussion incited a "flame war," which prompted Kratter to delete the posts. Kratter was unavailable for comment last night.