An FBI investigation is underway after unfounded calls reporting an active shooter on the University of Pittsburgh’s Oakland campus prompted a massive police response and student panic late Monday night.
University and city police responded to the campus at about 11:15 p.m. after police received three calls stating a shooter was in the Hillman Library on Forbes Avenue. In one call, the sound of gunshots was heard in the background, Pitt Police Chief Jim Loftus told reporters during a news conference Tuesday afternoon.
Police cleared the library before midnight and found no evidence of an active shooter in the building. As police cleared the building, an officer used a firearm to gain access through locked doors, Mr. Loftus said.
The chief estimated hundreds of students were studying in the library before the evacuation. Videos circulating on social media show herds of students running out of the library when police arrived at the scene.
Shortly after police cleared the library, they received another call from students who were concerned about noises they heard inside Mervis Hall, which is behind the library. Officers rushed to the academic building and cleared it as well, Mr. Loftus said.
FBI Pittsburgh is investigating the source of the hoax calls. Mr. Loftus does not believe the subsequent Mervis Hall call was a hoax. Referring to the unfounded calls as “terroristic,” the chief implied someone could be “testing” the department’s response to emergency incidents.
“It’s not just a grown-up’s version of some asinine prank,” he said. “This is not calling someone and saying, ‘Is your refrigerator running?’ This is big time. And it can't get any worse than this unless it was an actual incident.”
At 12:38 a.m. — over an hour after police initially responded — Pitt Police sent an alert through an emergency notification system that said university and city police responded to “multiple location pertaining to an active shooter” and cleared them all. The alert was sent about a half hour after Pittsburgh Public Safety announced that authorities cleared the scene and determined the calls to be unfounded.
The timing of the alert sparked frustration from some Pitt students and parents. Mr. Loftus said at the media conference that he took responsibility for the delay, which he attributed to the Mervis Hall call.
“Just about the time that the scene was clearing at Hillman, we were getting ready to put out an emergency notification message,” Mr. Loftus said. “We didn’t do that; we held off on that message. It would have been, quite frankly, irresponsible to put that message out not knowing what was going on at Mervis Hall at that time. That was my fault. It’s my responsibility.”
If a similar situation unfolds in the future, Mr. Loftus pledged that Pitt Police will alert the university community to avoid potentially dangerous areas.
Additionally, before the full alert was sent, police accidentally sent a premature alert. In a statement Tuesday morning, Pitt’s Office of Public Safety and Emergency Management said it is addressing that issue.
“To address the ENS issue, we are currently reviewing the system and retraining our communicators,” part of the statement reads.“...We understand you may want more information and want it faster. Public Safety’s goal will also continue to be to provide accurate information, so the content may be quite limited as officers gain an understanding of the situation. We can and will do better with the technology. ”
Tuesday, some Pitt students were concerned over the university’s handling of the situation. Sam Triulzi, a Pitt junior studying biology, lauded Pitt Police’s quick response to the incident but criticized the communication.
“I think there's just a level of distrust now on a student-to-student basis with the university as a whole, and they're not really doing anything to help themselves earn that trust back,” Mr. Triulzi said.
Mr. Triulzi said he would have liked to see the university apologize after the incident and cancel classes because students were shaken by the ordeal.
Pitt did open a student support space from noon to 2 p.m. Tuesday in the O’Hara Student Center, with a Campus Crisis Support team to connect with and assist students.
The incident came just shy of two weeks since schools around Pennsylvania, including in and around Pittsburgh, fell victim to swatting calls reporting active shooters at the schools.
Central Catholic and Oakland Catholic high schools near Pitt and Carnegie Mellon were among them.
First Published: April 11, 2023, 9:45 a.m.
Updated: April 11, 2023, 3:44 p.m.
