Some 20 Panhellenic sorority women were involved in a heated dispute Thursday morning over the discovery of the "black derby," hidden by Sigma Chi fraternity as a part of Derby Days.

Director of Greek Life Kristin Torrey said there were more than two Panhellenic chapters involved in the altercation but preferred not to specify which.

Sororities had been searching for the derby hat all week, in hopes of winning the fraternity's annual week of philanthropy and competition. The derby is worth 1,500 points toward the Derby Days championship.

Torrey sent an e-mail to all Greek women Thursday afternoon in condemnation of what she perceived as a physical altercation.

"The purpose of my e-mail was to avoid any further drama for the rest of the Derby Days activities, especially in the football games, because those have always been something our sororities are highly competitive in," she said.

However, Director of Crime Prevention Andrew Atwood said to the best of his knowledge, the argument remained verbal and no police were called to the scene.

"Based upon what I was told, it appears that it wasn't anything other than a verbal altercation," he said. "It appears that one of our officers happened upon female students this morning arguing over what turned out to be the derby that Sigma Chi uses for Derby Days."

Atwood said the officer who came across the incident handed over the derby to Sigma Chi, who awarded the points to Kappa Alpha Theta.

Torrey said in the e-mail that the fight near McGugin Center resulted in bite marks and a phone call to the police, contrary to VUPD reports.

"To people outside of the Greek community, our specific letters do not matter, and currently we look like stupid sorority girls fighting over a hat," she said in the e-mail. "Please show some class as we finish out the Derby Days week."

Torrey said it was likely that the women involved gave two versions of their story to her and VUPD.

"What somebody is going to say to a police officer is probably different than what they're going to tell me, but more than anything, the people that came in to see me today wanted to apologize for failing to represent the Greek community the way that they know they should," she said.

Torrey said she could not know definitively the extent of the disagreement, as she was not present when it occurred.

"The version of the story had gone through several different people before it got to me," she said. "So, ‘Did someone have a bite mark?' ‘Did someone not have a bite mark, I'm not really sure, but that was what I was told."

Torrey said that the incident is not "a big deal" and that the "magnitude of it is not over the top," as it involved a small subset of the hundreds of sorority women who participate in Derby Days.

"However, it is a big deal because we should show better Panhellenic spirit than those women today," she said. "We need to make sure that we are respectful of each other and that we are getting along."

"Derby Days is intended to be a fun event in which we raise money for the Children's Miracle Network. It is not supposed to be an occasion for ill words and drama between Panhellenic sororities," she said.