Update 11 a.m.
Though police originally said an officer responded to the report of a sexual assault at a PIKE house, Sgt. Janice Goodwin said Wednesday the officer did not in fact respond to a physical location. After police received a call reporting an alleged sexual assault that did not include an address, the responding officer called the number back but could not make contact with the person who had originally called police.
Sean McMinn
smcminn@mustangdaily.net
The San Luis Obispo Police Department (SLOPD) received a tip about an alleged sexual assault at a Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity house Friday night but did not find any evidence of one occurring there, according to police logs.
SLOPD Sgt. Janice Goodwin said though police came to the residence where the caller reported a sexual assault took place, the responding officer did not find anything there to suggest such a crime occurred.
“Everything that the officer determined at that time says the report was not truthful, or completely didn’t occur,” Goodwin said.
Though PIKE President Thomas Maher said the fraternity does not have one centralized house, but instead has unofficial residences its members live in around the city, the log states that police responded to “SLO;PIKE HOUSE” late Friday night. It does not list an address, which Goodwin said is standard in cases of reported sexual assaults.
Maher and Interfraternity Council President Jason Colombini both said Monday they were not aware police came to any PIKE-affiliated house Friday night. Since then, the two have both declined to comment to Mustang Daily, saying not enough information was available.
PIKE is currently restricted from hosting social events, participating in intramural sports or recruiting members due to violations of its risk management procedures, Colombini said.
Maher declined to specify Tuesday which infraction resulted in the fraternity’s probation, but Greek Life coordinator Diego Silva said the restrictions were placed on PIKE because Student Life and Leadership (SLL) feared the fraternity had too many members to effectively follow the fraternities rules and regulations.
“Once the chapter reaches triple digits, we start to have concerns,” Silva said.
SLL partnered with the fraternity’s national board to conduct a membership review, and the future of the fraternity will be decided once that is completed, Silva said. Until then, PIKE will remain on suspension.
As a student, I am extremely disappointed with the sub-par level of journalism shown in this article. The lack of evidence and information suggests to me that this is a spiteful attempt to gain publicity from a provocative headline that could potentially harm this organization. In fact, if you look at the tags in this article then maybe you’ll understand my point. Please make an attempt to make your newspaper worthy of reading.
Thank you and 100% agreed from a non ΠΚΑ member.
After reading this article I am astonished at the fact that this was published in the face of zero evidence and no substantial reasoning for following a lead that had already been pronounced a non-issue on the police blotter. This is an unnecessary piece of journalism aimed at tarnishing the reputation of a student organization with nothing more than a fragmented police report. I do not know whether you are specifically targeting this particular organization or if you have others in mind but I urge you to refrain from prematurely reporting on topics that hinge solely on a haphazard and uninformative police report.
“Everything that the officer determined at that time says the report was not truthful, or completely didn’t occur,” So why is this in the paper then? Why is the Mustang Daily out to get greek life? Sean you keep writing about breaking stories like this and no paper will hire you once you graduate. Get a life Sean and find some real stories to report on.