A recent incident involving a former student’s arrest for weapon possession has sparked concerns about campus safety at Ohio University.
On Sept. 3, a 27-year-old former OU student named Michael Rinthalukay was arrested for possessing an AR15 on campus and is accused of using social media to make threats to several groups of OU students.
Rinthalukay was banned from all OU campuses and was charged with having a weapon while under a disability, a felony of the third degree, making terroristic threat, a felony of the third degree and Inducing Panic, a felony of the fifth degree Sept. 9 by Athens County Grand Jury.
Currently, Rinthalukay is being held in Franklin County Jail and is awaiting a Rule 4 hearing.
Ohio University Police Department Captain Tim Ryan wrote in an email that processes within OUPD patrols and operations have not changed since the incident because they have been proven to work effectively.
“Our patrols have not changed since this incident,” Ryan said. “From our perspective, everything went very smoothly and confirmed that our processes are working well.”
Ryan said OU, along with most colleges and universities in the nation, fundamentally changed after the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007.
Since the Columbine High School, Virginia Tech University and Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings, training to deal with active shooters has changed to focus on facilitating a more direct response and how to watch for “leakage.”
“Leakage is a term used to describe when an individual intends to do harm and intentionally or unintentionally communicates that idea in some way before carrying it out,” Ryan said. “The goal in more proactive threat assessment is to be actively attempting to identify those warning signs and intervene.”
In addition to the extra training, an emergency text and email system and better equipped gear have been introduced to the police force.
Leading up to the incident, Rinthalukay was using Snapchat to message other freshmen. Emma Clement, a freshman pre-nursing student, first reached out to Rinthalukay after seeing a story he posted on the OU 2028 Snapchat story.
Clement said the conversation escalated from exchanging greetings to Rinthalukay responding to her stories and exhibiting strange behavior.
“I wasn’t scared until he got arrested, because I thought it was just some random crazy guy doing empty threats until I found out that he actually had weapons on campus,” Clement said. “But that was when he was already in custody, so I wasn’t really worried about it when it was happening.”
Since the incident, concerns around campus have grown about the possibility of assaults. Rinthalukay also contacted Emma Hesson, a freshman studying Psychology.
“Somebody literally could just have a gun, and it would not be a public spectacle,” Hesson said. “It would probably go unnoticed, and that's not a fun thought to think about, especially whenever school shootings and everything is really common these days.”
After blocking Rinthalukay, Hesson started avoiding certain parts of campus where people were spotting him. She said she had mild worries and was trying not to start anything else with him.
“Whenever you see other people getting it way worse, you're kind of cautious about it,” Hesson said.
Hesson said she is glad to know nothing had happened from Rinthalukay but worries about what could happen in the future.
Ryan said this year, only three assault reports have been taken, and only one of those occurred in the current semester, meaning assault cases are not increasing.
If you have encountered safety concerns while on campus, contact OUPD at 740-593-1911 or Athens Police Department at 740-592-3313. If it is an immediate concern, call 911.
