HSA Official Now Calls Theft Likely

A Harvard Student Agencies (HSA) room-by-room search through undergraduate dormitories has so far uncovered fewer than 50 refrigerators, and officials of the agency still cannot account for most of the 200 missing units.

The manager of the refrigerator agency said yesterday that he now "can only assume" that a large number of refrigerators were stolen early this fall from HSA's warehouse.

The manager, Clarence A. Martin '77-3, said he had visited the agency's warehouse in early October and found the door open and the lock apparently "pried open." He said he took no action at the time because he thought most of the refrigerators had already been delivered.

He said that HSA employees did not finish their room searches last Wednesday, but that in light of student and administrator protests he was not sure how or when HSA would proceed with its investigation.

HSA officials discovered only a few weeks ago that the agency was missing about one-third of its 600 refrigerators.

The general manager of HSA last week blamed the problem on "a lack of good clerical bookkeeping" and HSA's president said two days ago he hoped only HSA's paperwork was awry.

But Martin said yesterday that, after searching "most of the River Houses and about half of the Yard" dormitories, HSA employees had found only 49 refrigerators without current contracts.

"It looks like we're going to find far fewer than 200," Martin said.

HSA officials "will try to go through all the options" before calling the Harvard University police into the case, Martin added.

Daniel Del Vecchio, general manager of HSA, said yesterday that in early October the agency was not insured against theft. Del Vecchio said he arranged for fire and theft insurance in the warehouse only two weeks ago, but added that his action was not related to the case of the missing refrigerators.

Martin said he plans to repossess any refrigerators he finds by simply obtaining permission from House superintendents to enter students' rooms.

"Over the years that's always been the policy," Martin said. "This is our property."

Daniel Steiner '54, general counsel to the University, could not be reached for comment.