Police have arrested a 27-year-old man after students at The University of North Carolina Chapel Hill were sent into lockdown for the second time in three weeks by a gunman roaming their corridors.
Sirens blares and loudspeakers ordered students to seek shelter across the 730 acre campus as police answered a flurry of 911 calls shortly before 1pm.
By 2.15pm, the campus had been swept and deemed safe and 30 minutes later the Chapel Hill Police Department arrested Mickel Deonte Harris, 27, of Durham, on the other side of the city in Formosa Lane.
But the alert on Wednesday came just 16 days after a professor at the school was shot and killed by a student and left many on campus despairing at the threat of gun violence.
‘At UNC chapel hill, hiding in the student Union from our second shooter in three weeks,’ tweeted @valeriescull, ‘This is America.’
An alert of an armed and dangerous person was issued at UNC Chapel Hill on Wednesday. Above, police at the scene
Terrified students ran to safety on Wednesday amid reports of an armed and dangerous person
Professor Zijie Yan was shot and killed in a campus science building by student Tailei Qi.
He has since been charged with murder and is in custody.
Students reported that Wednesday’s alert was triggered after a person pulled a gun at the counter of Alpine Bagel in the UNC Student Union and threatened a member of staff.
‘My roommate and I were at the booth next to the window right near the register,’ one witness reported.
‘This guy came in a started yelling at the worker “You know me, come around (the counter) you know me’.
‘And the worker kept being like “I don’t know you”, until eventually he yelled “who the f*** re you” and that’s when the guy pulled he gun.
‘People started running ad my roommate and got under the table near the window because we couldn’t leave the booth (the guy was right there).
Students were locked in their classrooms and ordered to stay put as police hunted for the gunman
Many voiced fury at yet another gunman roaming their corridors
‘Then the lady Alpine worker came out and yelled at him to put it way and he put it back in his pocket and walked out of the union.
‘Alpine worker got us out the back of Alpine and we started running and I called 911.
‘Absolutely terrifying.’
Students still reeling from last month’s attack took to social media as the new alert was issued.
They shared eerie videos of lockdown sirens blaring across campus and told of their horror at having to shelter in place for the second time in a month due to suspected gun crime.
Some had been ejected from a meeting of the state legislature where they protesting about gun violence just hours earlier.
The alert on Wednesday emerged almost at the exact moment an email asking for feedback for campus safety after the August murder.
Among the first to comment was Parkland survivor and activist David Hogg.
‘This UNC email soliciting feedback on the campus response to the *last* shooting on campus arrived just as we received word of *another* armed and dangerous person on campus,’ he tweeted.
‘I’m locked down in my office, so I guess I have time to fill it out.’
Police said Harris was wanted on outstanding warrants related to an assault on September 5, 2023, when he was seized.
But many students were furious about having to run from a gunman again.
Lunches and belongings were abandoned where they were as the order was issued to get inside
A UNC faculty member, Zijie Yan, was shot and killed. He was the suspect’s academic advisor, it has been revealed
‘I am so sick of this,’ tweeted Emily Oetzman.
‘I deserve to feel safe at school, I shouldn’t have to associate my lecture halls with hiding.’
‘This is insane,’ tweeted Rysa Walker after the alert was lifted.
‘My son just ran a mile of campus in the middle of a crowd of panicked students after the *second* lockdown this semester and they expect him to “resume normal activities”?’