Student charged in hate-mail case
By Susan Kuczka
Tribune staff reporter
Published April 26, 2005, 2:17 PM CDT
A 19-year-old African-American student at Trinity International University has been charged with sending racially inflammatory hate mail to her classmates, prompting last week's evacuation of minority students from the north suburban school.
Alicia Hardin of Chicago was charged with disorderly conduct and committing a hate crime for allegedly writing threatening letters to other African-American students.
The letters were written in an attempt to convince her parents to let her withdraw from Trinity, Lake County Assistant State's Atty. Matthew Chancey said. Hardin lived on the Bannockburn campus, was unhappy there and wanted to transfer to Jackson State University in Jackson, Miss., he said.
"By writing these notes, we believe she wanted to have her mother believe (Trinity) was an unsafe environment," Chancey said.
Hardin was assigned a $5,000 bond during a hearing this morning in the Waukegan courtroom of Judge Victoria L. Martin. The defendant could be freed after posting 10 percent of the amount, or $500 cash...
...Police said the woman was one of a number of students interviewed Monday by a task force of investigators from the Bannockburn Police Department, the FBI, campus security and police from Deerfield, Highland Park and Libertyville.
Hardin allegedly admitted writing the three letters that caused the uproar...
...Today in court, Chancey read portions of the third letter, received last Thursday: "I saw you in the chapel …. I had my gun in my pocket, but I wouldn't shoot."
Excerpts - Copyright © 2005, Chicago Tribune
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