Samantha Mirkin rarely looked at the monthly newsletter from University Village, the private apartment complex for Temple Students at 10th and Montgomery Streets.

But when she saw it slipped under her door this afternoon she glanced at an April Fool’s poem on the back page and was shocked to see a line wishing for the extinction of Jews.

“It boggles my mind how people cannot see how offensive that is,” said Mirkin, 21, who lives in a furnished four bedroom, four bath apartment with three roommates for which she pays $750 a month plus utilities.

“They used the word extinct. Hitler tried to do that,” said the finance/real estate major, who plans to go to law school.

Her father, Lance, was even more upset.

“You can’t have this stuff. It’s not right. It’s very upsetting, especially if you’ve had relatives in the Holocaust,” said Mirkin, who owns a Yamaha dealership in the Poconos and whose aunt and uncle died in a concentration camp.

How the offensive line ended up in the poem is unclear. The original, a sweetly written wish for peace and harmony in the world, appeared in Dear Abby’s column and was penned by a deceased long-time reader, Jean Rogers Wells.

Rob Simmons, manager of 222-unit building said the mix-up was the work of a “rogue employee” who the company was trying to identify.

The office has about 20 workers and various people contribute to the newsletter, which contains information about events on campus or in the city, he said.

The poem “does not represent our views or standings whatsoever,” Simmons said.

The corporate owners of the building, American Campus Communities of Austin, TX, which manages or owns 130 student housing projects at 85 colleges, also condemned the bogus poem.

Chief operating officer Greg Dowell said they were “embarrassed and appalled by the content of this newsletter and we apologize to anyone who is offended by it.”

Whoever is responsible will be terminated, he said.

The newsletter is supposed to be reviewed by two managers prior to publication but that procedure was apparantly not followed.

“We’re pretty sure we’ve identified what took place,” Dowell said, but declined to elaborate.

The company prepared a release apologizing for the “disgusting, vile, hateful and offensive” statements to be distributed to every apartment in the building last night.

The joke poem comes six weeks after another anti-Semitic incident on the North Philadelphia campus. On Feb. 15 a 23 year old man was attacked by four Temple students who used anti-Semitic epithets. They’ve been charged with aggravated assault, simple assault, reckless endangerment of another person, ethnic intimidation and criminal conspiracy.

Rabbi Howard Alpert, executive director of Hillel of Greater Philadelphia, said that when he heard about the newsletter he called Temple dean of student affairs, Aimsley Carry, who met with students and Jewish leaders after the February attack.

While the apartment building is privately owned, Temple has “a responsibility to step in on behalf of their students,” Alpert said.

Temple contends University Village is taking the matter seriously so there’s nothing for them to do.

“It’s not our property, it’s not our employees,” said spokesman Ray Betzner.

Mirkin doesn’t blame Temple and has already signed a lease for the same apartment next year, she said. The building, built in 2004, is well maintained and has 24-hour security. But her father wonders how closely the company keeps an eye on what goes on over there.

“It doesn’t make sense. It’s not like a bunch of kids did this. This was company sponsored,” he said. “Somebody’s not watching what’s going on over there.”

Contact staff writer Kathy Boccella at kboccella@phillynews.com or 610-313-8123.