Hey David...do you or did you ever frequent the NetBSD/mac68k list? Your 
name sounds familar...

>	There might be incorrect permissions on /, /etc, /bin, dev, or
>	some appropriate file beneath.
>
>	You might want to ktrace a 'su' to a user to see on what it fails.
>
>		David/absolute
>
>           -=-  "If there is a hell... I'll see you there"  -=-
>

The kdump showed that the permission denied error comes upon trying to 
get into the home directory. But this makes no sense! I'm looking at the 
directory right now and it shows that its permissions are "drwxr-xr-x" 
and that the group "otaku:wheel" owns it (this is all as it should be). 
*What* could be hindering the action of su trying to access the 
/home/otaku dir?

The /home dir has the same permissions but is owned by root:wheel. Ditto 
for the / directory (someone suggested checking this).

Any ideas on this very enigmatic problem?

Thanks a lot...

--Josh Hope