NIU student falls to his death

DeKALB – Northern Illinois University officials remained tight-lipped about what happened Saturday night when a 19-year-old student fell to his death from the school’s Stevenson Towers dormitory.

“The NIU police are awaiting results of the cause of death investigation being performed by the DeKalb County Coroner’s Office,” NIU Police Chief Thomas Phillips said in a written statement issued Monday afternoon.

Coroner Dennis Miller identified the student as Oluwarotimi Okedina. An autopsy is scheduled for Tuesday on the second-year student who others described as “outgoing” and “energetic.”

Police were called to the 12-story Stevenson Towers C – one of four that make up the complex at the south end of the university’s student housing area – around 10 p.m. The student was found on the ground after falling from the 11th floor of the building, NIU spokesman Joe King said.

He was taken to Kishwaukee Hospital where he was pronounced dead, King said.

King said it remains unclear how Okedina fell. But King confirmed Okedina was not assigned to that building or the room from which he fell.

The student’s relatives were called immediately and went to the hospital.

“They were on campus the next day,” King said.

Social media swirled with news of Okedina’s death.

Chester Buford, 19, said he lives on the eighth floor of the tower where the incident happened. The sophomore sociology major said other students sent Snapchat and Instagram posts about what happened.

“It was crazy,” Buford said. “Everybody was talking about it yesterday.”

Okedina fell from a window that most students say seems too narrow for a body to pass through.

The tower’s windows are composed of two sections. One part is a larger pane that doesn’t open at all. Below that is a more narrow part that allows for pushing the glass outward, and it is screened. The screen slides left to right.

“I don’t know how you can jump through the windows because, we have screens but you can only like stick your arms out. Maybe your head. But your whole body can’t, like, fit out there,” Buford said.

University officials would not say how Okedina could have fallen through the window.

“All of that would part of an ongoing investigation. I couldn’t comment on it,” King said.

Nickolaus Hammock, 27, was assigned to Stevenson Towers C when he lived on campus in previous years. He wasn’t on campus Saturday when the incident happened, but like other students, he heard about it on social media. Hammock, a junior majoring in computer science, said he couldn’t believe either that a body could fit through the narrow windows in the dorm rooms.

“You’d have to pull the screen out, then you’d have to force your way through the opening,” he said.

Okedina’s Facebook page was filled with tributes, describing a personable man who also loved soccer.

“Never got the chance to tell you, I love you Timi always and forever,” Facebook friend Ashley Marie wrote.