Oct. 20, 2005, 10:15PM
Forgery suspect 'kept to himself,' a professor says Waller County sheriff says prints of student match those of ex-convict By EDWARD HEGSTROM Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle Okwudili Franklin Aluka, the Prairie View A&M student under investigation by the FBI, was quiet and kept to himself, according to one of his professors. Prairie View and state officials arrested Aluka, 30, on forgery charges last week after he allegedly tried to purchase a handgun with counterfeit money. At the time of his arrest, officials say they found suspicious chemicals and electronics equipment in his campus apartment that are now being investigated for their possible use as weapons, according to the FBI. Waller County Sheriff Randy Smith said officials also are trying to confirm whether Aluka is the same person as Oqu Franklin Aluka, who has the same birth date, address and Social Security number, and who served 10 years in state prison on a Harris County felony conviction for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. A Waller County Jail official examined two sets of fingerprints Thursday and determined the prints for Okwudili Aluka and Oqu Aluka match, Smith said. A professor who knew Okwudili Aluka, a Nigerian native, said he found no obvious signs of anything unusual about the student. "He came to class, but he pretty much kept to himself," said David A. Kirkpatrick, who teaches a computer engineering class this fall that Aluka enrolled in. Aluka first enrolled at Prairie View for classes this summer, according to Tyra M. Metoyer, a college spokeswoman. She said there were no signs of anything unusual about Aluka before officials said the chemicals were discovered in his apartment. However, Aluka did file a federal lawsuit earlier this year in which he accused the college and a number of professors, including Kirkpatrick, of violating his rights. In the sometimes unintelligible suit filed without an attorney, Aluka accused a math professor of teaching him an incorrect formula and alleged the library computer "libelously" listed some materials as being available when they were in fact lost. "I'm only one man, under manned and underpaid as again society venerates the disenfranchisement of my rights," Aluka wrote in the suit filed in Federal District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. The suit was thrown out Oct. 12, the same day as his arrest. In the suit, Aluka said he was not only a student at Prairie View but was also "employed" as a student assistant, which Metoyer confirmed. State driver's license records indicate that Aluka lives at the same address in Katy as Innocent Aluka, 55, a physics professor at Prairie View. When contacted earlier this week, Professor Aluka refused to comment. Aluka previously studied at North Harris and Trinity Valley community colleges, Metoyer said. A representative of Trinity Valley said the only Aluka they had on record was Oqu Aluka - the same name as the assault convict - who took courses from 1996 through 2003, while he was in the custody of the state prison system. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Fair play? Video games influencing politics. Click and talk back! http://us.click.yahoo.com/VpgUKB/pzNLAA/cUmLAA/TySplB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> -------------------------- Want to discuss this topic? Head on over to our discussion list, [EMAIL PROTECTED] -------------------------- Brooks Isoldi, editor [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.intellnet.org Post message: [email protected] Subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *** FAIR USE NOTICE. This message contains copyrighted material whose use has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. OSINT, as a part of The Intelligence Network, is making it available without profit to OSINT YahooGroups members who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information in their efforts to advance the understanding of intelligence and law enforcement organizations, their activities, methods, techniques, human rights, civil liberties, social justice and other intelligence related issues, for non-profit research and educational purposes only. We believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/osint/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
