A potentially dangerous situation at the University of California Riverside appears to have been defused over the weekend, at least for the moment. School authorities alerted the campus police department after “evidence of a weapon” was found in the student housing apartments. The responding officers found an AR-15-style rifle, five extended magazines, ammunition, and a journal containing hand-drawn images “depicting a violent act.” The police seized the rifle and related gear and the student was suspended and ordered to leave the campus, but not arrested. As we’ll discuss below, this may look like a situation where the school dodged a bullet (both literally and figuratively), but resolving this case through the legal system will likely prove to be significantly problematic. (ABC 7 News, Riverside)
Authorities at University of California Riverside removed a student from school after seizing an assault rifle, ammunition and violent hand-drawn images from campus housing, officials say.
The incident happened on Friday, when the UCR police department executed a search warrant in a campus residence hall “after evidence of a weapon was found on campus,” the school said in a message to students.
Officers searched a room in the North District residential apartments and found an assault rifle registered to a student, ammunition, five high-capacity magazines and “hand-drawn images in a journal depicting a violent act.”
Few details have been released beyond what I included above, so we don’t even know how the authorities were made aware of the presence of the rifle in the student’s apartment. I’m not trying to minimize the potential for a very bad outcome here and it sounds as if the student’s drawings caused alarm, though they aren’t being described in detail. But as we’ve discussed here in the past, sketching disturbing drawings isn’t a crime. Writing disturbing fantasies is similarly not illegal unless he was writing specific threats of harm against another person.
Moving on to the weapons and accessories, the campus police describe the rifle as being “registered to a student.” Assuming it’s the same student, that means he probably obtained it legally. California is one of those hybrid states where you have to be 21 to purchase a handgun but you can legally buy a rifle at 18. He could have been above the minimum legal age even if he’s a freshman. The rifle’s magazines are only described as being “high capacity.” But California still allows the ownership of magazines holding up to ten rounds, which is considered higher than the default. The magazines could very well have been legal as well.
Given all of that, it’s unclear to me on what basis the campus police found the authority to seize the student’s property. You’ll notice that he was not arrested, but only detained and released. It’s not apparent that a single law was broken here. They may be forced to return his property to him. The school suspended him and ordered him off campus, but he’s still free. Perhaps they have some sort of rule against possessing firearms on school property (assuming such a rule would even be legal), but the guy didn’t shoot anyone. It’s not even being reported that he discharged the firearm at any time. At least at this stage, it sounds as if this young man had his property seized and he was run off of campus based on nothing other than exercising his Constitutional rights. He could conceivably have grounds for a lawsuit when all is said and done.
There’s another potentially disturbing angle to this story, however. UC Riverside, like many other campuses, has been the site of pro-Hamas protests in recent weeks. The school became the first in the area to reach a deal with the protesters to get them to disband. Was this student stockpiling arms and ammunition for some action as part of those protests? The police aren’t revealing any details about the “violent hand-drawn images” or other writings at this point. But if they did point to something to do with the protests, that could be important information going forward. Or it could be something else entirely. The student’s name and other details are not being released. Was he trans? Was he receiving any sort of mental health treatment? These could all be possibilities, but it may prove impossible to learn all of the pertinent details, at least for now.