Pitt students protest after delayed communication from university during shooting hoax

PITTSBURGH — Anger, frustration and even fear have students at Pitt lying in protest.

“Our first awareness of what was happening was through Twitter videos, Instagram and Sidechat. It was a very graphic video of people fleeing Hillman and jumping off barriers and officers firing shots into the building,” said Sharon Bennett who’s a student at Pitt.

An active shooter hoax sent dozens of officers to Hillman Library Monday night. One officer even shot out a door to gain access to the building. But the problem for these students is the fact it took 82 minutes to be notified by the University on what was occurring.

“If it was a real emergency nobody knows how to appropriately respond so that’s our big issues. We don’t want to be in those situations where we don’t know what’s going on and the university isn’t protecting us and our safety,” said Zoe Fontecchio who is a student at Pitt.

So, for 82 minutes they lay on the lawn and demanded more from their school. When we asked about its response, the university released the following statement.

“While police did rapidly respond to the false alarm of a potential active killer, we acknowledge unacceptable shortcomings in the use of the Emergency Notification System, and we are committed to doing better. The University has begun a major review of the procedures, policies and tools we use to communicate during emergencies, and we are immediately making the necessary changes to ensure accurate information is available to our Pitt community in a timely manner.”

In addition, regarding student complaints about doors being locked in Hillman Library on Monday night: “The Deputy Fire Marshal toured Hillman Library this week to review exit restrictions and concluded that no fire code violation occurred.”

Earlier this week, the Pitt Police chief apologized for the delay in notifying the community. In the meantime, the students said there will be a town hall on Monday to air more concerns directly to the administration.

“There are academic consequences to this right because the decision to not shut down the university after this event was a very impactful decision for many students,” Bennett said.

One thing these students would like to see is more active shooter training and education. The University said those opportunities are available to all staff and students year-round, you just have to request it.

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