MIT Officials Say First-Year Student's Death Was Suicide

Two days after MIT first-year Michael P. Manley fell from a 14th floor dormitory window and died, yesterday still little was known about his last hour.

Witnesses said Manley fell from a window opening in the A entryway of MacGregor House, an MIT dormitory, just before 3 p.m. Saturday.

Although windows in MacGregor House rooms have security locks that prevent them from being fully opened, MacGregor residents said Manley fell from an open common room window that was not protected. Residents said MIT officials had planned to install protective bars over such common room windows because of a suicide in a nearby building last March.

From MIT's East Cambridge campus to his hometown of Tempe, Ariz., Manley's friends and family are mourning their loss. "He was a wonderful boy who filled our lives with joy," said William Manley of his son.

On Saturday, an MIT press release written by spokesperson Kenneth D. Campbell called Manley's death "an apparent suicide." An MIT official added that Manley had not left a note.

However, MIT Police Chief Anne P. Glavin said in an interview yesterday that it is too early to tell whether MacGregor's death was a suicide.

"We haven't [concluded that]," Glavin said. "As far as we're concerned, it's a sudden death and we'll have to wait and see what the medical examiner says."

Asked if the MIT News Office had been too hasty in issuing some of the details in its press release, Glavin declined to comment.

But Robert J. Sales, the News Office's associate director, said yesterday that Saturday's press release was accurate.

"We have information that indicates it was a suicide," he said.

Residents of MacGregor said that Manley largely kept to himself in the 15-story high-rise. He lived in a single in the G entryway, room 211.

Several students told The Crimson MacGregor had been "depressed" and had talked of suicide.

"Michael had a group of friends. They got him to say that he was going to see someone [to get help]," said a female sophomore who also lived in MacGregor House. "He seemed very happy. [Yesterday] was the day he was supposed to get help," she said. "You never get used to things like this. I wish I could have coincidentally walked in on him [before his fall]."

The Master of MacGregor House, Munther A. Dahlel, said that although she had not gotten to know Manley, his death had hit her and the house community hard.

"People are very upset," Dahlel said. "But we've done a real good job in supporting each other."

A memorial service will be held Thursday at 5 p.m., Dahlel said. The location has not been announced.

The most recent suicide at MIT was on March 13 of last year, when first-year Phillip C. Gale of Charlotte, N.C. jumped from a window of his 15-story dormitory.