EVANSTON, Ill. (AP) – The Latest on report of shots fired at Northwestern University. (all times local):
4:35 p.m.
Police say that the report of a gunman in a residence hall at Northwestern University in suburban Chicago was a hoax.
Evanston Police Commander Ryan Glew says the Wednesday afternoon call was a “swatting” in which someone calls in a false report in the hopes in prompting a police department SWAT team to respond.
Nobody was injured and Glew says the student who the caller reported had been shot by a boyfriend has been located and she is safe.
Glew says the call came from outside the Chicago region – southeast of Rockford in northern Illinois – and that the apartment that police responded to had been vacant since around Thanksgiving.
The call prompted Northwestern to urge people in the area to “shelter in a safe place and stay until further notice.”
Such calls can be extremely dangerous. In December, police who responded to such a hoax call fatally shot a man who answered his door in Wichita, Kansas.
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3:41 p.m.
Authorities are urging people at Northwestern University in suburban Chicago to take shelter after a report of a gunman and shots fired in a student residential building.
In a Twitter post Wednesday afternoon, Evanston police say there was a report of a gun and “shots fired” but that officers had not found “evidence of a victim, scene or gunman.”
University spokesman Jon Yates says the report comes from Engelhart Hall, a graduate student dormitory. But he says the university has not confirmed that any shots were fired.
The university also sent a tweet asking people to stay away from the area and to “shelter in a safe place and stay until further notice.”
The report comes as students across the country walked out of school to protest gun violence.
