Guns / Firearms, Law Schools

Update: All Quiet on the Northwestern Front

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If you have friends at Northwestern Law School, there’s no need to worry about them. This morning’s situation with a gunman — er, man with a gun — has been resolved, without incident or injury.
Here’s the latest update from the Northwestern University website (at 1:30 p.m. Chicago time):

Chicago campus buildings open

All buildings on Northwestern’s Chicago campus, including all Law School buildings — Rubloff, Levy-Mayer and McCormick — are now open. An intensive search of the buildings on the Chicago campus was conducted but no one matching the description of the man reported with a gun was found. The investigation into the incident is continuing.

A recap of events, a description of the man, and commentary from Northwestern law students, after the jump.


Events unfolded in real time on the NU website. It started off like this, with a posting at 10:25 a.m. (all times are Chicago time):

There has been a report at approximately 10 a.m. Wednesday, January 27, 2010 of a man with a gun in his waistband on the eleventh floor in the elevator of the Rubloff Building on the Chicago campus. The man is described as a white male wearing black jacket, blue jeans and a button-down shirt. All persons in the Rubloff Building should stay in their offices and lock their doors. Members of the Northwestern University Police Department and Chicago Police Department are currently searching the building.

At 11:15 a.m., a description of the man was provided:

He is described as a white male in his 20s, approximately 5 feet 9 inches tall, brown-blonde hair, wearing a button-down shirt, blue jean [sic] and a black jacket.

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A white male in his twenties. In a button-down shirt and jeans. At a law school in the midwest. Good luck with that.
At 12:50 p.m., the building lockdown was ended:

The intensive search process at the Rubloff Building has been completed, but police remain on site and are continuing to investigate. People in the building no longer must remain behind locked doors and are being allowed to move about in the building. However, access to the building remains restricted. Northwestern Law School will hold classes this afternoon.

Finally, at 1:30 p.m., the building was reopened and the “all clear” was sounded. It appears that some used that as their opportunity to clear out. From an NU law student, around 2 p.m.:

Back to business as normal. In class now, but it’s two-thirds empty.

Well, if there’s a good reason to play hooky, we think that having some random guy with a gun roving around your law school qualifies. Law students + guns = trouble.
UPDATE: Here are some comments on the prior post that we especially appreciated (we skipped over all the ones debating gun control — Too Substantive, Didn’t Read):
17 – I hope the gunman doesn’t hurt anyone’s feelings by saying the search was so gay. [Ed. note: If you don’t get the reference, read this.]
43 – This isn’t breaking news. “Biglaw Interviewers at Northwestern Law.” Now THAT’S breaking news.
46 – I really wonder if this wasn’t even a gun and just some paranoid kid seeing a cell phone or something else sticking out of this guy’s pants. I mean how far can you get on a college campus with a gun showing? This isn’t South LA….
67 – I blame the Student Bar Association for not letting students use offensive or homophobic language to vent about their exams. Now this happens.
69 – THIS IS EXACTLY WHY I WENT TO YALE. [Ed. note: Umm, have you been to New Haven?]
118 – Why has no one speculated that the gunman is probably a crazy law student angry about the recession? Too obvious to point out?
119 – Granted, I’m from Texas, but since when is just having a gun (since it’s not mentioned that it was pointed, aimed, fired, or even loaded) newsworthy?
121 – I refuse to let this intimidate me unless we find out that the gunman was an asian law student.
Earlier: Breaking: Gunman Man With Gun at Northwestern Law

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