Another Real Life NMSU Mystery!

NMSU's Lt. Col. David Abbott, OIC of the ROTC Program, and Patrick Robinson's Story of the Admiral's Statue that Miraculously Peed for Three Days Straight!

Forward:

When some of the male UTEP fans both physically assaulted and verbally assaulted one female NMSU ROTC program photographer, and at the same time trash-talking bench-warmers of UTEP Coach Price's Miners made like they were Duke University's lacrosse team running hot in a Duke U. Pack Attack Mode against another NMSU female student press photographer, the big shots on the University of Texas Board of Regents in Austin mistakenly thought they had weathered the storm.

By the end of the first year afterwards they gradually came to realize they had been wrong.

Dead wrong!

Because by July, 2006, there was a brand new joker in the deck.

As our UTEP student newspaper put it, in one of Sports Editor Joe Velarde's articles in the June 21, 2006 issue, "New assistant AD takes wheel: Wickstrom looks to drive Miners to next level."

This was Michegan's Brian Wickstrom, who as he must have put it to Joe Velarde, was "[o]riginally a banker."

Only time would tell!

Chapter One: Erica writes a letter to the editor.

On September 14, 2005, the following Letter to the Editor appeared on page two of the University of Texas at El Paso's student newspaper, "The Prospector."

The newspaper's duty editorial page layout person for that week headlined the letter "Game day manners." The letter itself was a criminal prosecutor's dream in its matter of fact concisenss and had this to say:

"I understand that the rivalry between UTEP and New Mexico State has been going on long before I was born. Such rivalries are supposed to instill school spirit in students, alumni and fans alike. These are the types of games that many wait months for. But on Saturday, Sept. 3, I saw the worst type of human behavior, not from the players on the field but from the UTEP fans and UTEP football players on the sidelines.

"As I was walking up the stairs of the southwest side of Aggie Memorial stadium, I witnessed a large group of UTEP fans throwing bottles, spitting on, physically and verbally threatening men in full military uniform. These young men are members of NMSU's Army ROTC program. They are being trained to become officers in the Army. Once they graduate they will be deployed to serve their country in Iraq. Many already have, and do as members of New Mexico's National Guard.

"What I find ironic is that most of these fans probably own the popular We Support Our Troops car magnets. If these so called patriots did support their troops, why did they attack grown men in full uniform? These young men are no different than soldiers stationed at Ft. Bliss.

"What was also shocking was the behavior of male UTEP fans toward women. I saw several UTEP fans physically push and verbally assault the ROTC program's photographer. This young woman, who stands 5'2" and weighs less than 100 pounds, was almost knocked off her feet by men twice her size. The UTEP football players made disgusting sexual gestures and sexual comments toward a female NMSU photographer, while Coach Mike Price stood within earshot. So this is the pride of El Paso?

"The behavior of UTEP fans was not only uncalled for, but deplorable. Not even at the larger rivalries such as that between Michigan and Ohio State, do fans act in this manner. If everyone brought themselves down to this level we might as well become the soccer hooligans we see so much on Wildest Police Videos. This was the proof that I needed to solidify the fact that I chose the right school."

Proud Aggie

Erica E. Saucedo class of 'o5

What Erica had inadvertently discovered was just the tip of an iceberg. It was a sad, all-too predictable commentary on the consequences of what happens when a formerly all-American University becomes totally out of control, the veritable academic equivalent of an Enron of Texas-style continuing criminal enterprise, as so many of us had come to call it.

Moreover, a continuing criminal enterprise where everything under the sun, and not just sex, spelled s-e-x, was for sale. Big time!

And it had all been going on since even long before June, 2003, when yours truly became heavily involved, as we tell about in the very next chapter.

Stay tuned!

Chapter Two: From Russia for sex: When UTEP's academic crime syndicate went truly international, and made big bucks and FBI history