Standoff with student shuts down UM-Rolla campus

ROLLA, Mo. (AP) -- A distraught graduate student claiming to have a bomb and anthrax sparked a police standoff in a classroom building Tuesday that shut down the University of Missouri-Rolla for several hours, officials said.

Nearly two dozen people, including a faculty member and eight other students, were being decontaminated after a white, powdery substance was found.

School officials said "possible bomb materials" were also found when the man was taken into custody. Officials described the man as a graduate student who was apparently depressed and upset about his grades.

The standoff started around 2:30 a.m. in a civil engineering building on campus.

Acting Police Chief Mark Kearse said that when police arrived, the student held up a bag and said: "This is a bomb." He was armed with a knife and also claimed to have anthrax, Kearse said.

Police used a stun gun to subdue him. They also found a four-page note in which the student threatened to destroy the building, Kearse said.

The Fort Leonard Wood Explosive Operations Division was investigating the possibility that a bomb may be in the building, and members of the Missouri National Guard were called to campus.

The man's identity and nationality were not released, though school spokesman Lance Feyh said he was an international student. The man was taken to a nearby hospital to determine if he was contaminated with anthrax, city spokesman Scott Grahl said.
Mayor William Jenks and Kearse said the student had been distraught over his grades, which may have led to the incident. Jenks said the student "had problems and was depressed."

The 5,850-student technological research and engineering school campus in south-central Missouri was shut down during the incident and classes were canceled for the day while officers investigated.

"We have no hard evidence that there's anything wrong in the building but we simply can't take a chance," Jenks said. "We're taking a very cautious approach."

Those exposed to the powder included a faculty member in whose lab the graduate student was found and eight students working nearby, said campus spokeswoman Mary Helen Stoltz. The remaining people exposed to the powder were emergency personnel who responded to the scene, she said. It wasn't yet clear what the substance was.
Stoltz reiterated Kearse's belief that the student was "using the threat of terror to get attention."

"We believe the situation is completely under control," she said. "For now everybody's safe."

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The only thing I can get out of anyone is the suspect is from the "International Community" that's PC code for Middle Eastern.