On Jan. 6, at 12:34 a.m. the Oakland University Police Department responded to a emergency call that was placed when a 28-year-old male pulled a knife on people during a party on OU’s campus.

The male suspect is a resident of Rochester Hills and is not, nor ever was, a student at the university.

The suspect pulled the knife shortly after he was asked to leave the party he was attending in the Nicholson Apartments.

“We got a tremendous response from students,” said Mel Gilroy, OUPD lieutenant. “A lot of students gave us his name and number and called in after they saw the report.”

Witness reports given to OUPD state that the suspect started to wave the knife around, yelling “Who wants to go?”after being asked to leave the party.

Gilroy made fliers to hang on all of the housing units, as campus officials alerted students by using social media like Twitter and Facebook to inform students of the incident.

According to Gilroy, the suspect was called on a cell phone number that was provided by students.

On his own, the suspect came  to the station to make a statement on Jan. 7, but was not arrested at that time, as they OUPD is for an arrest warrant.

Admitting to pulling the knife on the students, the suspect said that his reason for brandishing the weapon was because of self-defense.

According to Gilroy, the warrant can take up to a month to be processed by authorities.

The suspect has been banned from campus, and has been deemed “persona non-grada,” meaning “person not welcome.”

Gilroy said that OUPD’s main obligation is to inform students when instances like this occur on campus.

“Anytime a certain group of crimes have a potential to risk, we’re obligated to put out notices,” Gilroy said. “Usually we will get three to four, but six events is big for one year.”

 

Contact staff reporter Christopher Lauritsen via e-mail at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter @ChrisLaurtsen