A University graduate student was arrested Wednesday after he allegedly called in a bomb threat that closed the Knight Library for about an hour while Eugene Police Department officers searched the building.
Two EPD officers familiar with the facility searched for a bomb, but after a thorough sweep none was found. In the meantime, hundreds of library patrons were forced to wait outside from about 3:45 p.m. to 4:45 p.m.
James Gregory Evangelista, a 46-year-old special-education graduate student, was arrested several hours later after police traced the call to a pay phone at the University Bookstore, police said.
Surveillance footage showed Evangelista talking on a pay phone around the time the bomb threat was made, according to an EPD press release. Evangelista was cited with menacing, harassment and disorderly conduct.
There was no answer when a call was made to Evangelista’s phone number listed in the University Student Directory. A woman answered a call to Evangelista’s number listed in the phone book, a different number, and she said she does not know him.
EPD spokeswoman Kerry Delf said the motive for the bomb threat was unclear. Delf said the bomb squad was not sent to the scene, but six EPD officers investigated the incident as a “probable hoax.”
At about 3:30 p.m., the Emerald received a call from a man claiming he placed a bomb in the library to protest President George W. Bush’s administration. An Emerald employee contacted a Department of Public Safety dispatcher, who said it was the second call DPS had received.
DPS Interim Director Thomas Hicks said DPS received a call from library staff about the bomb threat, and Hicks decided to evacuate the building after consulting with library officials and EPD.
Personal Materials Clerk for University Libraries Jen Lindsey made an announcement over the public address system shortly before 3:45 p.m. telling everybody to evacuate the building for safety reasons. No alarm was activated, she said.
Lindsey stood outside the library’s Media Services entrance blocking access to the building and told people it might be 30 to 45 minutes before people would be allowed inside. She said she saw only officers inside the building before leaving.
After establishing that the building was safe, DPS reopened it at 4:40 p.m., Hicks said. The bomb threat was the first he could remember the library receiving, and it was the first bomb threat directed at the University in a couple of years.