Students claim police mishandled complaint

Parkway Central High School '94 Chesterfield, Mo. Two University students alleged that several drunk Drexel students ethnically intimidated them at 2 a.m. on March 24 and that University and Philadelphia police subsequently mishandled the case. College senior Bela Shah and Wharton senior Monika Parikh, both residents of the off-campus apartment complex Hamilton Court, awoke when four Drexel students and another man made an unusually loud exit from Cavanaugh's Restaurant around the corner. Although Shah and Parikh asked them to lower their voices, the Drexel students proceeded to harangue them with racial slurs such as "Indian bitches" and "dotheads" for about 15 minutes until University Police arrived in response to eight phone calls complaining about the noise. Shah said four University Police officers, along with one Philadelphia Police officer, questioned individuals at the scene. Two of the police officers tried to dismiss the case altogether, she said. But the one black University Police officer, Rudy Palmer, insisted on pursuing the case. University Police took Drexel students Gregory Rosenbaum and Victor Vencus into custody and drove them to the Philadelphia Police Southwest Detectives. Shah and Parikh went to the station as well, but they were not questioned when they got there. The suspects were released hours later and the witnesses sent home. When the two students met with Victim Support Director Maureen Rush the next day, however, the case was reopened and warrants were issued for the arrest of Rosenbaum and Vencus, who later surrendered to police. Both men were charged with ethnic intimidation. A hearing was originally scheduled for May 9, but lawyers for Rosenbaum and Vencus requested a continuance until August 8, according to University Police Commissioner John Kuprevich.