THE REAL DOPE ON RYERSON

Murders Of Drug Dealers With Links To University A Concern For Students

What's that whiff at Church and Gould? Weed, what else? You are in the
middle of a university.

Says here that one in three Canadian students toked up in the past
year. I bet Ryerson is no different.

Drug violence is no stranger to campuses either.

I know this. I was one of the notorious Boys of the Fifth at Carleton
U.

One fine day in 1974, four punks invaded the fifth floor of Glengarry
House, where I lived as a freshman.

They pistol-whipped the floor's hashish pedlar, who was
17.

A 19-year-old ran to the rescue and was promptly shot in the
shoulder.

Next day some wit pinned up a note.

"What you heard here, what you saw here, let it stay here. (Signed)
The Boys of the Fifth."

I did not write it. I was a low-level Boy of the Fifth and was off
drinking beer during the attack.

A great media cry arose and Carleton's prez was criticized for being
lax on drugs and for not throttling The Boys of the Fifth.

"I don't want to bring back the days of loco parentis," he said,
meaning a university is not a parent.

So how do we react to the murders of two drug dealers with Ryerson
links?

BOTH DEALT DRUGS

Both have been posthumously awarded Nice Guy medals. Maybe, but both
trafficked in drugs.

Should we fear their murders are the iceberg's tip, that Ryerson is a
drug cauldron set to explode?

One victim, Alexander Christoff, 27, last attended Ryerson 10 months
ago, and he was stabbed to death March 11 in Etobicoke, so the link to
campus is iffy.

The death of Will Kim, 30, strikes closer to home. He was gunned down
Friday at his highrise apartment on Gerrard St.

True, this was, oh, five paces off university property, so Ryerson
security is absolved.

But the building houses mostly students and is half a block from Kim's
architecture classes on Church St.

Anyway, it was too damn close, especially for moms.

"I wish I could take her out of here, bring her home safe to Milton,"
Linda Kulagowski, 54, tells me. It is her birthday and daughter
Jessica, a photo student, is taking her to see Wicked.

"It's scary," says Linda, of the latest murder. "I'm worried about her
24 hours a day. But she's 22 now, it's her life."

Jessica: "It always has to do with drugs or gangs and I'm not involved in
that kind of stuff."

Mom: "But what about innocent bystanders?"

Jessica: "Know your safety boundaries and you're okay."

Or try to stay in the bubble.

Ryerson is bordered, roughly, by Gerrard, Mutual, Dundas and Victoria
Sts.

"We can't control what people do off campus," university spokesman
Bruce Piercey, 44, tells me. "Our focus is keeping our area clear."

Security and 51 Division swept druggies off campus five years
ago.

Increased patrols, zero tolerance and surveillance cameras have held
the wolves at bay since then.

The security bulletin posted at the architecture building lists no
drug offences, though the guy seen jerking off in the library remains
at large.

Staff-Sgt. Tom Kelly of 51 Division tells me he can't think of the
last serious drug call on the campus.

"There's a lot of it off-site, but that's just the
neighbourhood."

"We love being downtown," says Bruce Piercey. "The advantages far
outweigh any negatives."

'INVISIBLE BOUNDARIES'

As long as the bubble does not burst.

"There are invisible boundaries that everyone knows about," says Kelly
Brown, 23, a fashion communications major.

"Step over them and you're in a different part of town."

These are adults, of course, scurrying to and from class. They can
make their own choices.

Theatre students lounge in the sun as Gerrard St. bustles
by.

"Parents should let their kids know this stuff exists," says Antonio
Cayonne, 23, glancing at Will Kim's highrise.

"The kids who fall into horrible traps are the ones who haven't been
taught about the dangers of the world."

"Being our age," says Dan Roberts, 23, "there's drugs no matter where
you are, but it's not a safety issue at all on campus."

Just life, and death, in the big city, I guess.

(Signed) A Boy of the Fifth.