UM-Rolla shut down Tuesday after 'terrorist-type' scare
Published Feb. 28, 2007
Police took a UM-Rolla graduate student into custody Tuesday morning after authorities said he made threatening comments and gestures, according to a UM system news release.
The UMR Police Department received a call at approximately 2:30 a.m., after the student claimed to have a bomb and displayed a white, powdery substance, UMR spokesman Lance Feyh said. The powder has since been confirmed as powdered sugar.
The student's name has not yet been released because he has not yet been charged with a crime.
The release stated the student had been making "terrorist-type actions."
Police apprehended the student upon their arrival. Feyh said there was no standoff between law enforcement officers and the student involved.
The student initially was taken into custody by UMR police and later transferred into the custody of the Rolla Police Department. He was still in custody and being questioned by police officers as of 2 p.m.
The students working inside of the Butler-Carlton Civil Engineering Building at the time of the incident were quarantined in the Physics Building, located across the street from the site of the incident. The students were detained so they could undergo decontamination if necessary, pending the lab tests on the white powder, Feyh said.
He said the students were released when authorities determined the powder was not dangerous.
Feyh said there were about 23 people inside the Butler-Carlton Building at the time the graduate student was apprehended. Eight of those people were UMR students, according to the release.
"There's some emergency management people in there with them," Feyh said while the students were being held. "They could have been sprayed and decontaminated and gone through the whole thing. But because none of them are showing signs of sickness, they are not going through that process until something comes back from the lab."
Feyh said that none of the individuals involved showed any signs of illness and have had adequate access to food and water.
In addition to local authorities, the Missouri State Highway Patrol and FBI also were dispatched to assist with managing the incident.
"We were notified and assisted local authorities when appropriate," said Peter Krusing, FBI spokesman for the St. Louis field office.
Krusing declined to comment further about the role of the FBI agents sent to Rolla, and instead referred comments to local law authorities.
UMR students will have a day off from school while authorities continue working with the situation on campus. All daytime and evening classes were cancelled at the university, and all non-essential employees were asked to remain off-campus.
UMR freshman Rachel Somodi said she heard about the incident second-hand, when a friend from Kansas City called her to tell her about the bomb threat. Somodi said the friend had been worried about her.
"I got up and checked my e-mail, and they sent one out that said classes would be cancelled until 10:30 a.m., but they didn't say why, or anything about a terrorist attack, or anything like that," Somodi said.
Somodi then said she went back to sleep and planned to wake up in time for her 11 a.m. class, which would have been in the Butler-Carlton Building.
But by the time she woke up to start getting ready for her class, the school had announced all of its classes were cancelled for the day, Somodi said.
"One of my friends was in the building, but he couldn't talk to us or anything," Somodi said.
Feyh said the university plans to return to "business as usual" on Wednesday.
"At this point, we hope it was just a distraught student perpetrating a hoax," Feyh said.
— Crime editor Elliot Njus contributed to this report