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Suspect Is Killed in Attack at Ohio State University That Injured 11 Suspect Is Killed in Attack at Ohio State University That Injured 11
(about 1 hour later)
Eleven people were injured Monday on the campus of Ohio State University when a student veered his car onto the sidewalk, leaped out and stabbed several people with a butcher knife, law enforcement officials said. The attacker was shot dead within about a minute by a campus police officer. A student at Ohio State University intentionally rammed a car into pedestrians on a busy campus sidewalk on Monday morning and then began slashing passers-by with a butcher knife, the authorities said, injuring 11 students, faculty and staff members and setting off panic at one of the nation’s largest public universities.
Two law enforcement officials identified the suspected attacker as Abdul Artan, 18. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because the name had not been made public. The officials said that Mr. Artan was of Somali descent. A university police officer fatally shot the suspect within about a minute of the attack, but the sprawling campus in Columbus, Ohio, remained on lockdown for about an hour and a half as people ran for cover and barricaded themselves in academic buildings and dorms.
Mr. Artan is listed as a logistics management major in Ohio State’s online directory. Officials at Columbus State Community College said Mr. Artan also attended that school and graduated with an associate of arts degree. He was on the Columbus State dean’s list in 2015 and graduated cum laude. Investigators were looking into whether the attack was an act of terrorism and were seeking information on the student, Abdul Artan, a permanent United States resident from Somalia who was studying logistics management at Ohio State.
The authorities said on Monday afternoon that they were investigating whether the attack may have been an act of terrorism. The F.B.I. was investigating comments on Facebook indicating that he may have felt Muslims were being persecuted, an investigator said.
“We believe the threat was ended when the officer engaged the suspect,” said Monica Moll, the university’s director of public safety. “We’re very fortunate that an O.S.U.P.D. officer was there and took quick action, and we believe that injuries were minimized as a result of that.” Last summer the student newspaper, The Lantern, published an interview with Mr. Artan in which he complained about being afraid to pray in public as a Muslim, because of people’s negative perceptions of the religion.
Eight of the hospitalized victims were believed to be stable, and another patient in critical condition was expected to survive. “I was kind of scared with everything going on in the media. I’m a Muslim, it’s not what media portrays me to be,” he told the newspaper. “If people look at me, a Muslim praying, I don’t know what they’re going to think, what’s going to happen. But I don’t blame them. It’s the media that put that picture in their heads.”
The attack began at 9:50 a.m. on Monday, when “this car suddenly appeared on the sidewalk,” said Angshuman Kapil, a graduate student. “It was in high speed and it just hit whoever came in front of him.” The car stopped only when it rammed a concrete block, he said.
A campus police officer, Alan Horujko, 28, shot Mr. Artan after he failed to follow orders to drop his weapon, and officials credited the officer with helping to save lives. All of the wounded were expected to survive, university officials said.
Six people were struck by the car, and five had stab wounds or lacerations, doctors said. The injured were being treated at three local hospitals.
No evidence has emerged that Mr. Artan had any connection or allegiance to radical ideology. Though no terrorist group had claimed responsibility for the attack, the Islamic State was updating its online audiences on the rampage on Monday.
Both the car-ramming and the knife attacks are now established forms of aggression inspired by the Islamic State. An attacker in Nice, France, used a delivery truck to kill dozens of pedestrians in July, and chats between an attacker in Wurzburg, Germany, and his Islamic State handler indicate he was initially told to use a car to carry out his assault that same month, before he settled on using an ax because he did not have a driving permit.
The authorities in Ohio said it was too soon to know what motivated Mr. Artan, but they said it was clear the attack was deliberate. Mr. Artan’s Columbus residence was surrounded by squad cars, crime scene tape and a bomb squad truck on Monday afternoon, and police officials said they were waiting for a search warrant.
“This was done on purpose,” said Chief Craig Stone of the Ohio State University police. “To go over the curb and strike pedestrians and then get out and start striking with the knife — that was on purpose.”“This was done on purpose,” said Chief Craig Stone of the Ohio State University police. “To go over the curb and strike pedestrians and then get out and start striking with the knife — that was on purpose.”
The attack, initially reported as an “active shooter” by the university, stunned students who were returning to class after Thanksgiving break, leading to a 90-minute shelter-in-place warning and an admonition from campus officials to “Run Hide Fight.”The attack, initially reported as an “active shooter” by the university, stunned students who were returning to class after Thanksgiving break, leading to a 90-minute shelter-in-place warning and an admonition from campus officials to “Run Hide Fight.”
Haylee Gardiner, a sophomore, said she was on her way to a chemistry lab when the attack happened around 9:50 a.m. Haylee Gardiner, a sophomore, said she was on her way to a chemistry lab when the attack occurred.
“I saw a bunch of people running, and when they were running, they were screaming and yelling,” said Ms. Gardiner, who scrambled to a residence hall for shelter. “And then all of a sudden, I heard four or five gunshots.”“I saw a bunch of people running, and when they were running, they were screaming and yelling,” said Ms. Gardiner, who scrambled to a residence hall for shelter. “And then all of a sudden, I heard four or five gunshots.”
Sean Cody, 23, from Akron, Ohio, was running late for his philosophy class, and after hearing a loud boom, he sprinted into a building to alert fellow students.Sean Cody, 23, from Akron, Ohio, was running late for his philosophy class, and after hearing a loud boom, he sprinted into a building to alert fellow students.
“Then there was a bang, a dust cloud, then shouting and screaming, and people just booking it in every direction,” Mr. Cody said. “Then, 30 seconds, a minute later, there were gunshots.”“Then there was a bang, a dust cloud, then shouting and screaming, and people just booking it in every direction,” Mr. Cody said. “Then, 30 seconds, a minute later, there were gunshots.”
During the chaos, students huddled in locked rooms, and some took to Twitter, posting photos from inside barricaded classrooms.During the chaos, students huddled in locked rooms, and some took to Twitter, posting photos from inside barricaded classrooms.
The episode was reported near Watts Hall, a building at the heart of the university’s sprawling Columbus campus that houses materials science and engineering programs. Officials said it was unclear whether a fire alarm at that building earlier Monday was connected to the attack. Ohio State administrators released little information about Mr. Artan, and parts of his background remained unclear. He was admitted to the United States in June 2014 as the child of a refugee, federal officials said, and was believed to be in his late teens or early 20s. He graduated cum laude from Columbus State Community College with an associate of arts degree, officials there said. He was on the Columbus State dean’s list in 2015.
Heavily armed SWAT teams swarmed the campus, and at one point could be seen making their way up a stairwell of a nearby parking garage before taking two people away in handcuffs. They were not believed to be suspects. Officer Horujko, who joined the university police last year, had also been profiled in The Lantern. An Ohio native and a graduate of the university, he said he decided to be an officer after working in campus safety as a student.
Monday’s violence comes after a February machete attack at a Mediterranean restaurant in Columbus, which also ended with the police killing the suspect. The restaurant’s owner told reporters he believed he was targeted because of his Israeli heritage. Also, in September, a young Somali man, Dahir Adan, was killed by the police in St. Cloud, Minn., after stabbing 10 people at a shopping mall. As Ohio State officials took stock of the attack and made plans for classes to resume on Tuesday, they said they were thankful the injuries were not more severe and were optimistic that students would come together even if investigators discovered a link to terrorism.
The episode on Monday was the latest mass-casualty episode on an American college campus. Multivictim shootings at Virginia Tech, Northern Illinois University and California’s Oikos University, among several others, have led colleges nationwide to plan how to respond to an attack. Monday’s instruction to “Run Hide Fight” came from a training program used by Ohio State and other groups for reacting to active shooting situations. “Our campus community is extremely tolerant,” Michael V. Drake, the university president, said in an interview. “The concept of branding a whole community for the act of a few leads to an intolerance that can make the world a more difficult place for all of us.”
“We prepare for situations like this, but always hope never to have one,” said Michael Drake, Ohio State’s president. The episode was reported near Watts Hall, a building at the heart of the campus that houses materials science and engineering programs. Heavily armed SWAT teams swarmed the campus, and at one point could be seen making their way up a stairwell of a nearby parking garage.
Monday’s violence followed a machete attack in February at a Mediterranean restaurant in Columbus, which also ended with the police killing the suspect. The restaurant’s owner told reporters he believed he was targeted because of his Israeli heritage.
The attack on Monday was the latest mass-casualty episode over the last decade on an American college campus. Shootings at Virginia Tech, Northern Illinois University and Oikos University in California, among others, have led colleges nationwide to plan how to respond to an attack. Monday’s instruction to “Run Hide Fight” came from a training program used by Ohio State and other groups for reacting to active shootings.
“We prepare for situations like this,” said Dr. Drake, the university president, “but always hope never to have one.”
Muslim leaders in Ohio praised the police for their response and urged the public not to make assumptions about the attacker’s motives.
“We as yet know nothing about the motivation of the attacker, but we do know of his Somali heritage, and that will be enough for some people to falsely link this tragic incident to the faith of Islam and to the Somali and Muslim communities,” said Roula Allouch, national board chairwoman of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “We must not jump to conclusions. It is important to let the investigators do their jobs.”
Gov. John Kasich also praised the police response, saying it showed “how much practice, how much training, how much expertise, how much coordination” existed among local law enforcement agencies.
“We are a strong, tough, resilient community,” he said.
Mayor Andrew Ginther of Columbus said that Monday was “one of those days you’re grateful for good training and great people across the board,” and urged unity in the days ahead.