On Sept. 23, 1970, Brandeis University woke up to another day of classes, cool fall weather and news of a murder and bank robbery at the hands of three of its students. There were five people suspected of murder and robbery, three of whom were associated with Brandeis. According to the Sept. 29, 1970 issue of the Justice, the suspects included Robert Valeri, 21, a student at Northeastern University; William Gilday, 41, also a student at Northeastern; Kathy Power '71, 21, a senior at Brandeis; Susan Saxe '70, 20, a Brandeis graduate and admitted Brandeis graduate student; and Stanley Bond, 25, also a Brandeis student. The five were accused of murdering Boston patrolman Walter A. Schroeder during a robbery that gained the group $26,000 from a Brighton, Mass. bank. Schroeder, 42, had nine children; he died from a gunshot wound in the back.

Although Brandeis was not new to revolutionary activity-it was home to the National Strike Information Center, and 60 students took over Ford Hall in a 1969 protest-the incident drew much negative attention. Still, according to the Sept. 29, 1970 issue of the Justice, then-University president Charles Schottland expressed "his and the University's 'abhorrence' for the 'criminal' savagery of the slaying and affirmed Brandeis's academic mission." Schottland also emphasized that "the three students [had] recently 'severed all relationships' with Brandeis."

Neither Power nor Saxe seemed like the typical murder suspect. Power had graduated at the top of her Catholic Denver high school and had served as an administrative aide to the Brandeis Student Council. Saxe transferred from Syracuse University and graduated from Brandeis magna cum laude in June 1970, according to the Sept. 29, 1970 issue of the Justice.

Gilday, Valeri and Bond, however, had been paroled from the Walpole State Prison within 90 days of each other the previous spring. In the Justice, Schottland said that Bond, an honorably discharged Vietnam War veteran, was accepted into Brandeis "because his record seemed such an excellent one for school."

Prof. Jacob Cohen (AMST) explained that there are several theories as to why these students robbed the bank. The culprits affirmed that the robbery was an act of protest against the war in Vietnam.

"The reason given by [Valeri], the man who was first arrested, was that they were going to use the money from the bank robbery toward various projects in the anti-war resistance," Cohen said.

Following the incident, Valeri was promptly arrested, and Bond was arrested soon after. Until his arrest several days after the murder, Gilday eluded "the largest manhunt in New England history [at the time], involving 800 policemen," according to the Sept. 29, 1970 issue of the Justice. Saxe went "underground" as she was hiding from the FBI until she was arrested in 1975 and served time in prison until 1982. Power, however, remained "underground" until 1993, when she was placed in prison through 1999. According to an Oct. 12, 1999 issue of the Justice, Power was unable to "suppress her conscience any longer [and] turned herself in to authorities and pleaded guilty to charges of murder." Prior to her arrest, Power took on the alias Alice Metzinger and lived a small-town life in Oregon, according to the Oct. 12, 1999 issue of the Justice.

Although it is often assumed that this violence was kindled by a Brandeis precursor to the Weather Underground-as the students involved in the incident and the Weather Underground shared similar missions and mentalities-this is likely not the case. An FBI release from Jan. 29, 2004, "1975 Terrorism Flashback: State Department Bombing," removed a photo of Katherine Powers "because she was inaccurately associated with the Weather Underground."

Cohen agreed that there was no formal connection between the Weather Underground and Walter Schroeder's murder.

"I know that that link between Kathy and the Weather Underground has been made, ... but I don't know of any formal connection between the Weather Underground and that operation," Cohen said.

However, Cohen also said there was certainly an ideological connection between the acts of the Brandeis radicals and the Weather Underground in that they were willing to use violent means to achieve their goals.

Albert Axelrad, the University's rabbi and Hillel director from 1965 to 1999, described the significance of the bank robbery and murder of the policeman in his thesis paper, "Activism at Brandeis: An Anecdotal Review":

"So strong and intense was this opposition [to Vietnam], that it once exceeded all moral bounds and wound up expressing itself in the single most shameful chapter of Brandeis' young history."

Following the incident, there was a widespread negative reaction against Brandeis throughout Boston.

"For many months after [the incident], it was not intelligent to go into Boston with a Brandeis sticker on your car," Cohen said.

Schottland also offered all of Schroeder's nine children full four-year scholarships to the University. Norm Levine, the track and swimming coach at the time, also collected money from Brandeis students for Schroeder's family, according to the 1970 issue of the Justice.

Although Cohen maintains that it is hard to generalize about the political and social atmosphere on the Brandeis campus leading up to the incident, Jeff Soref '71 wrote in a letter to the editor in the Oct. 13, 1970 issue of the Justice, "One can say accurately that [the students involved in the illegal incidents'] behavior was influenced in no small way by the environment which has prevailed at Brandeis recently." He went on to explain that "the environment at Brandeis has been one of harassment and coercion, both roundly endorsed by the University community in an effort to appease those people employing such tactics."

Upon her release from prison in 1999, Power expressed a great deal of remorse for her actions. According to an Oct. 12, 1999 issue of the Justice, she said, "I will always carry my human responsibility for the sorrow my actions have caused."

In response to Power's release from prison, Clare Schroeder, Walter Schroeder's daughter, said, "I don't know what forgiveness is in this circumstance. I'm not going to extract any vengeance. I don't wish her ill will. Other than that, she has no significance for me.