State Goes After Term-Paper Mill That Bought Ads in Daily Aztec : College: Attorney general seeks injunction against firm for violating State Education Code.

A suit has been filed against a Los Angeles company that advertised term-paper writing services for a fee in the San Diego State University student newspaper.

The suit, filed in San Diego Superior Court by Atty. Gen. John Van de Kamp on Tuesday, seeks a court injunction barring the firm from selling term papers for academic credit.

The suit alleges that the company, Research Assistance & Student Marketing Service, a partnership owned by Barton Lowe and Arthur W. Stekel, advertised in the Daily Aztec over a two-month period last year, offering custom research and research papers for sale, in violation of the state Education Code.

The suit, filed on behalf of California State University trustees, follows a similar suit filed last week by Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Ira Reiner against the same company.

On Thursday, the suit had not yet been served against the defendants, and Lowe and Stekel were unavailable for comment.

The complaint follows an undercover sting investigation jointly conducted by the attorney general’s office and the university’s public safety department, said Deputy Atty. Gen. Kathleen B.Y. Lam on Thursday.

The code prohibits the marketing of research papers for a fee if the vendor “should reasonably have known, that such term paper, thesis, dissertation or other written material is to be submitted by any other person for academic credit.”

Since December, the firm has completed at least one paper for investigators with the knowledge that the paper was to be used by the buyer for academic credit at SDSU, the suit alleges.

Lam declined to discuss the undercover operation, saying the suit had not yet been served on the defendants, but she said students had purchased papers from the company as well. The suit seeks unspecified actual and punitive damages, and payment for the cost of the suit.

“Over several years, a lot of campuses have experienced the problem of term-paper mills trying to pawn off their work as student work and advertising in student newspapers,” said Vice Chancellor Mayer Chapman, general counsel for the state universities.

“The education code says it’s unlawful and should be enjoined. It really strikes at the heart of the education process,” Chapman said. “It subverts the whole education process. It deprives students of the experience of learning how to do research and organize their work. That’s what education is all about--being able to put your thoughts together and communicate them to someone else.”

Michael Car, SDSU’s judicial coordinator in charge of student discipline, said his office has received complaints from the Academic Senate about the ads, but nobody has officially turned in a student for pawning off one of the company’s papers as his own.

“Nobody has reported that to me. It should have been if it happened.”

Cal State officials said they will attempt to obtain the names of CSU students who bought the papers from the company’s client list.

The company named in the suit is no longer advertising its services in the Daily Aztec, said the paper’s editor, Jon Petersen. But the paper’s editorial board confirmed the paper’s policy to continue accepting any advertisement for legal products or services about two weeks ago, said Petersen. The policy is set by the student board and approved by the university’s Communications Authority board, he said.

Petersen said companies offering research services have been operating for years and have not been shut down. “If the attorney general or courts determine it is illegal, they should shut the businesses down, and we won’t run the ads any more.”

Petersen said that, although he personally feels there is something shady about a firm that promises not to sell the same paper at a school for two years, research firms do perform a service as a bibliography source or starting point for research. “There’s nothing wrong with that,” he said. “We’re not responsible if students misuse the service.”

The paper’s advertising coordinator confirmed that Research Assistance was no longer advertising with the paper, but it had since begun accepting ads from another Los Angeles research company.

“Research Assistance told our sales representative in August it was becoming too much trouble to advertise in the Aztec,” said Matthew Dathe. “They were getting too much heat from it.

“We were upset because we had put a lot on the line defending their right to advertise with us. When I was editor, we got a lot of heat (for) running the ads. . . .

“We can’t control the end use of any products advertised. Alcohol can be detrimental to the educational process, but we don’t prohibit alcohol ads. If we ran an ad for guns, it’d be the same thing. If people are going to cheat, they’re going to cheat.”

The paper, which is supported by about $750,000 in annual advertising revenues, falls under the domain of the Associated Student Body, said university spokesman Rick Moore.

The university provides building space and electricity but does not contribute to the paper, he said.

The faculty has been very firm in its feeling that the research services should not be advertised, but the Communications Authority board, which includes university officials, has sought not to interfere with the student board’s decisions on advertising products which are not illegal, he said.