St. Xavier student charged in threatening graffiti case

[May 03, 2008]  CHICAGO (AP) -- A 19-year old student was charged Friday with scrawling a doomsday message in a dorm bathroom that led authorities to close St. Xavier University for several days last month, officials said.

Katherine W. Loberg of St. Paul, Minn., was charged with one count of criminal defacement of property and one count of disorderly conduct, both felonies, said Chicago police spokeswoman JoAnn Taylor.

Loberg was due in bond court Saturday. Taylor did not know whether Loberg had an attorney.

She has been placed on immediate administrative suspension and is barred from campus, said St. Xavier spokesman Joe Moore.

"We would like to express our gratitude for the support and tireless efforts of the multi-agency task force investigating this incident," the university said in a statement.

The Roman Catholic liberal arts school of 5,700 students closed its campuses in Chicago and suburban Orland Park for four days, starting April 11, after the discovery of graffiti in a restroom at Regina Hall that read, "be prepared to die on 4/14."

In the next few days, similar graffiti sparked the closure of two other Chicago-area colleges, a Michigan college and an entire suburban Chicago school district. The closures came two days before the anniversary of the Virginia Tech killings and two months after the deadly rampage at Northern Illinois University.

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On the Net:

St. Xavier University: http://www.sxu.edu

[Associated Press; By KAREN HAWKINS]

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