BU: Craigslist Killer? What Craigslist Killer?

Boston University had a bit of a public relations problem last month when it was revealed that alleged Craigslist Killer Philip Markoff was a student in the university's Med School.

It wasn't so much an issue that Markoff had allegedly murdered a woman and robbed two others that he met through the "adult services" section on Craiglist  - after all, any university of 16,000 or so students is bound to have a bad apple or two. It was that mid-April is prime decision time for potential incoming freshmen and not the best moment for little Suzy's parents to learn that the urban campus their daughter is considering boasts it's own home-grown murderer who allegedly kept his victims' underwear as trophies.

So what was BU's response to the crisis? Censorship and silence, at least in part, according to the Daily Free Press student newspaper.

In a recent article, the paper quoted anonymous sources saying that folks in the admissions office had "hidden" copies of the Daily Free Press that contained splashy Markoff headlines, lest they be seen by impressionable pre-freshmen and their parents. A university spokesman, however, said he had no knowledge of any papers being removed or relocated.

The paper also remarked on the lack of comment on the Markoff case by BU officials and quoted student tour guides saying they had been issued Craigslist Killer "talking points" by the university. To the BU's credit, though, the guides said they had been advised to talk about the case in a "civil, real, and authentic" manner.