Student arrested on Washington campus after racial threats

SEATTLE – Most, but not all, students returned to Western Washington University in Bellingham on Monday as police arrested a 19-year-old accused of making racial threats against black students and others on social media that shut down the campus last week.

Western Washington University police arrested the male student on campus and booked him into jail on suspicion of felony malicious harassment. The student has been suspended and banned from campus pending the outcome of legal proceedings and the university’s student conduct process, officials said in a news release.

Administrators canceled classes last Tuesday, the day before the scheduled Thanksgiving break, after learning about the remarks that included threats of violence against the student body president, who is black.

The university is working with Yik Yak, an anonymous social media platform popular among college students, to turn over the names of the commenters, who posted pictures of the student body president, a gun, and references to lynching and nooses. Officials said the student arrested Monday has been linked to a threat posted on the social media platform and that university police are continuing to investigate.

The long stream of posts mentioned almost every ethnic group, including blacks, Muslims, Jews and American Indians, blaming them for an effort on campus to debate changing the university’s mascot, a Viking. The threats came days after several student leaders suggested that the mascot is racist.