Alpha Phi sorority had a welcome sign, placed for the benefit of new freshmen, stolen.
During “Polish Week,” the week before sorority recruitment, Alpha Phi hung a banner on their back patio, facing Kentucky Avenue for all incoming students to see. Around the time Aug. 17 came around, though, the sign had suddenly disappeared with no hint or clue as to where it had gone.
“We left the house, and I didn’t notice it was gone,” said Halston Strange, president of Alpha Phi. “But that morning when we came back, we saw the back gate, and it wasn’t there. So, we think it was taken sometime in the middle of the night.”
While at first it may seem that the theft of the banner was little more than a prank from one Greek organization to another, it quickly became apparent that this was not the case. After contacting the other Greek organizations on campus, Alpha Phi found no further answers, and all very seriously confirmed that they had nothing to do with the disappearance.
“I really don’t suspect it was a fraternity,” Strange said. “When it was, it was always in good fun. They might take our letters, send us mocking pictures of them, but they always returned them in the end. So this is just not in their nature.”
Unfortunate as it is, this is not the first reported incident of sorority property being taken without return. Last spring, a number of the wooden letter decorations placed outside the sorority houses were taken one-by-one, and though police reports were filed for all of them, none were ever returned.
“We actually had to buy new letters, because they didn’t actually give us our Phi back,” said Lysa Engle, a sophomore member of the Phi Mu sorority. “So we had to buy a new Phi and Mu.”
The banner was designed and funded by the members of Alpha Phi, making its theft all the more upsetting to the sorority. A police report has been filed, but if the sign is returned to Halston Strange or to Alpha Phi itself, it will be accepted with no questions asked.
“If somebody just wants to set it on our doorstep and run away, we’d honestly be more happy than anything,” Strange said.
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