UNC More than an hour after the campus community was placed on lockdown due to a report of a “armed and dangerous person,” local police gave the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s students, staff, and others the all-clear to “resume normal activities.”
UNC Since the beginning of the semester, the school has had two lockdowns in response to similar threats. After the lockdown, according to university authorities, classes were postponed for the remainder of the day, said UNC Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz at a news conference on Wednesday.
“No issues. At 2:10 p.m., local law enforcement posted “All clear” on X, formerly known as Twitter.
The college informed understudies through email at 12:54 p.m. that “the Ready Carolina alarms have been enacted in light of the fact that police have detailed a furnished and hazardous individual on or close to grounds.” ” The public was given instructions to “go inside immediately, close all windows and doors, and stay until further notice” and “follow directions from emergency responders.”
What happened?
According to UNC Chapel Hill Police Chief Brian James, witnesses saw the suspect brandishing a gun over an employment dispute at Alpine Bagel in the campus’s Student Union. The suspect, 27-year-old Mickel Deonte Harris, was named.
According to a Chapel Hill Police Department press release, the individual was captured and detained “on outstanding warrants related to an assault an assault on September 5, 2023.”
According to him, police are still looking at Wednesday’s campus video. Despite the fact that the man’s motivation is still unknown, they “believe there was some sort of connection” between the armed individual and the suspect, according to James.
UNC Chancellor: ‘It’s sad and alarming”
Guskiewicz said, “It’s unfortunate and frightening that there have now been two lockdowns on our campus over the past 16 days where we’ve had to detain people who violated the safety and well-being of our community.
“I want to be clear: Guns are prohibited on our campus and every campus across the state of North Carolina,” he said, reminding the campus community of the prohibitions on firearms on campus.
Second threat since the start of semester
Guskiewicz said, “It’s unfortunate and frightening that there have now been two lockdowns on our campus over the past 16 days where we’ve had to detain people who violated the safety and well-being of our community.
“I want to be clear: Guns are prohibited on our campus and every campus across the state of North Carolina,” he said, reminding the campus community of the prohibitions on firearms on campus.
Jason Naulty, a law student at UNC Chapel Hill, experienced recent memories as a result of the lockdown. Naulty and other students received a similar alert while they were in the same classroom on campus where they had been on August 28.
Because of how soon after the previous alarm was put out, he and his peers speculated that there may have been a systemic error. Naulty claimed he experienced a “magnified sense of frustration” when they discovered there was another armed individual on campus.
Thank goodness, nobody was wounded or lost anything. After today, I suppose my overall sentiment is more annoyance than anything else. In reality, today it was merely the overpowering sense of disbelief, he claimed.
Due to the lockdowns, Naulty and his classmates will have to make up the two classes they missed, he said, adding to his irritation over “gun policy and gun culture in this country.”
The Hill reported that on Tuesday at the North Carolina Legislature, protesters from the university’s March For Our Lives chapter urged people to vote out state lawmakers for failing to enact gun reform and were then ejected from the hearing. During the lockdown on Wednesday, other students used social media to advocate for more stringent gun laws across the state and the country.
According to federal data from the National Center for Education Statistics, the number of shootings using guns on American school campuses has reached a record high, with 188 shootings resulting in fatalities during the 2021–2022 school year.