[TYPO3] not able to delete directories

[Bing Du]

Hi,

Typo3 V4.0.4

I logged in as admin.  When I tried to delete a directory in
File->Filelist, the error I got was:

1: Could not delete directory! Write-permission problem? Is directory
"/var/www/html/cms/fileadmin/dept/front_page_photos/images/Faculty_and_Staff"
empty? (You are not allowed to delete directories recursively).

Yes, the directory is not empty.  But in User->Setup, recursive delete
checkbox is checked.  The owner and group of the directory is apache and
www respectively.  And the web server is running as user 'apache'.  The
permissions of the directory are

drwxr-xr-x  3 apache apache 4096 Jan 10 09:10  Faculty_and_Staff

Anybody know why the directory cannot be deleted?

Thanks in advance.

Bing