After a very tense few hours of lockdown at University of Virginia at Wise (UVa-Wise) Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2013, things are finally back to normal. A call came in around 8:15 p.m. that reported a gunman, and the campus immediately went into a lockdown. At 10:08 p.m. the campus website read:
Lock down continues. Alleged gunman on campus. Stay put, lock all doors until further notice!
You can read about the initial reports here.
The Times-News had these details about the student who reported the gunman ”
“A student called from Culbertson Hall, and reported seeing a man wearing sweatpants, a ski mask and carrying a pistol," Oakes said.
Around 11:00 p.m. authorities realized it was a hoax. The Times-News reports the stern warning from Wise County Sheriff Ronnie Oakes:
But at around 11 p.m., Oakes said investigators had made the determination that the report was false. There will be legal consequences, he said.
“We don’t have an (identity of the student) to put out there yet, but there is still restitution to take into account, when you consider all the response with our deputies and others,” the sheriff said. “Filing a false report is a violation of law, of course. We’re trying to get all the information we can right now, and we’ll see where we’re at with this in the morning.”
Twitter was in a panic mode with people trying to find out what was going on. Few news people even knew about it, and most of the news was coming over Twitter. A couple of television stations in the area had skeletal reports.
If someone pulls a prank such as this on purpose, they should be penalized for the terror that they wrought on the students and, especially, on the parents at home. This doesn't even take into account the expense and manpower that was wasted.
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