Western Washington University police officers on Monday arrested a student whose Yik Yak posts last week were among those viewed as so threatening to black and other minority students that the university shut down last Tuesday and resumed classes only on Monday.
According to a statement on the university’s website, the student, 19-year-old Tysen Campbell, faces a felony charge of malicious harassment. He has been suspended and barred from the campus for the duration of the legal proceedings and the university’s student-conduct process against him.
The statement says that university investigators were able to identify Mr. Campbell as the source of threatening posts with the help of Yik Yak, the company that runs the anonymous social-media service. The police investigation continues.
The arrest and resumption of classes occurred on the same day more than 300 people attended a town-hall event on the campus for a discussion described as the first in a series about the racial climate at Western Washington. According to The Seattle Times, the university’s president, Bruce Shepard, offered an apology at the meeting for what has been described as his slow response to the threats.
Karen Dade, the event’s moderator and the associate dean of the university’s education school, said the Yik Yak posts by various commenters — which mentioned lynching, nooses, and a gun — reminded her “of the very real fear that I and others have for this campus,” the Times reported.
