DATE: Wednesday, November 5, 1997           TAG: 9711050420

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B9   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS 

DATELINE: BLACKSBURG                        LENGTH:   43 lines

POLICE CHECKING HOW STUDENT WHO FELL OUT WINDOW GOT ALCOHOL

State Alcoholic Beverage Control agents and Virginia Tech police are trying to determine where an 18-year-old student, who apparently fell to her death from a dormitory window, obtained alcohol.

Mike Jones, the campus police chief, said Melinda Somers of Arlington apparently was drunk when she rolled out of her bed and out the eighth-floor dorm window early Saturday.

``We have a young lady that, assumption-wise, is inebriated,'' Jones said Monday. ``Someone either had to give it to her or she had to buy it.''

Providing alcohol to anyone under 21 is a misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail and a $2,500 fine. Jones would not say if any charges were pending.

Results of an autopsy showed that Somers died from massive chest and abdominal injuries, said Dr. David Oxley, deputy chief medical examiner for western Virginia. A report on Somers' blood-alcohol level won't be available until the end of the week at the earliest.

The sophomore and a group of friends had been drinking at several off-campus parties for at least four hours Friday night and early Saturday to celebrate Halloween, according to officials. Based on conversations with students, police believe Somers was intoxicated when she went to sleep, Jones said.

Somers' body was found on the grass beneath Slusher Tower, the all-female dormitory in which she lived.

Officials said the woman's bed was next to the open dorm window, and sometime early Saturday she apparently rolled out of her bed and through the screen on the open 16-inch-tall-by-44-inch-wide window.

Three friends were asleep on the floor and Somers' roommate was in her own bed, but none awakened when she fell.

``I think we're just dealing with a very, very bizarre accident,'' Jones said.

Tech officials said the 10-story dormitory, which opened in 1972, complies with state building safety codes, but they have ordered an examination of the windows.

School officials are advising students not to place their beds next to windows.

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