After a fight broke out on Mill Street early Sunday morning, students allegedly spotted a gun-toting individual in the area.
Multiple Ohio University Police Department and Athens City Police Department officers were on Mill Street early Sunday morning for what witnesses described as a "riot" situation.
Witnesses told Post reporters on the scene that an unidentified individual was seen around midnight at 118 Mill Street, where a porch had caved in earlier.
"It was a crazy house party. One of the people who lived here came up to me and they were like, 'we gotta shut down, the porch caved in,'" Tyler Wharrey, an OU student who was DJing the party, said.
Witnesses also said a fight broke out near that residence and that individuals attempted to overturn a vehicle.
"The chick who lived (at the house) pulled up. She was parked in the middle of the street. I thought she was going to hit one of the cars that was parked there. She punched a dude that she knew a couple times," OU student Joe Lazuta said.
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Wharrey said people tried to flip the female's vehicle. From there, the fighting escalated into what some witnesses called a "riot."
"And then some belligerent dudes started wailing on each other. I tried to pull a couple people off of each other. It was just nonsense. It was just drunken belligerence," Lazuta said.
Then, witnesses said the rowdy individuals turned their attention to a semi-truck that was trying to turn onto Palmer Street.
"There was a semi, and they were throwing beer bottles at (the driver's) car," OU student Sierra Schaaf said.
Soon after, APD and OUPD officers arrived on the scene.
"Some Mack truck for some reason decided to pull down this street even with all the people there. People were going 'OU oh yeah, OU oh yes' and then the cops showed up," Lazuta said.
Police officers later chased a man down Mill Street and tazed him.
"I heard someone got tazed, but I’m more concerned about this porch," Wharrey said.
One witness also said he spotted an individual with a gun near the scene.
"I saw a guy on foot. He ran into a back yard, and I was informed by a friend who was informed by a policeman that (the individual) had a gun, and that he was detained and arrested," Brock Ferrell, an OU student studying computer engineering, said.
APD declined to comment just before 1 a.m.
This is a developing story. Stick with The Post for updates.
— Megan Henry and Julia Fair contributed to this report.
