2 dead, 1 hurt in UCA shooting

CONWAY - Two people were killed and a third person wounded in a shooting Sunday night on the University of Central Arkansas campus, police said.

Campus police and the Conway Police Department were investigating late Sunday and were not releasing the names of the victims.

Lt. Rhonda Swindle, a spokesman for UCA campus police, said she did not know if the two people killed or the wounded person were students.

Lori Ross, a spokesman for Conway Regional Medical Center, said all of the victims were men. One died at the scene, and two others were taken to the hospital with gunshot wounds about 10 p.m.

One of those victims, an 18-year-old, died at the hospital, Ross said. A 19-year-old was treated and released, she said.

A 911 call reporting a shooting on campus was recorded at9:52 p.m., Swindle said. Campus police found a body near the Arkansas Hall dormitory and the Snow Fine Arts Center.

There were reports that police had made an arrest in the shootings, but Swindle at an 11 p.m. news conference said she could not confirm that. A notice on UCA's Web site late Sunday said a suspect was in custody and that the campus was closed.

Interim UCA President Tom Courtway announced that classes at UCA are canceled today, saying students "are going to be distraught."

Tyler Carpenter, 18, of Little Rock said he was inside the State Residential College, a dormitory, looking out a window when he heard five gunshots and saw a man run out of Arkansas Hall and a car drive off.

Arkansas Hall and State Residential College are across the street from one another.

There was a body on the ground between Arkansas Hall and the Snow Fine Arts Center, Carpenter said. He said he did not see any other victims.

Carpenter said he turned to tell others in the dorm that he had seen someone get shot.

"They thought I was kidding," he said.

Carpenter said students in Arkansas Hall then went outside to see what had happened.

Students tend to gather outside Arkansas Hall, and there was a group of about five people outside the dormitory Sunday night at the time of the shooting, Carpenter said.

Sarah Wilson, a freshman who lives at a dorm nearby, said she heard nine shots from her open window.

Employees at the dorm reactedquickly, she said.

"They were over the P.A. system in two seconds," Wilson said. "They'd never been through this, but they knew what to do."

The employees moved students to an end of the dorm, away from a door that doesn't close properly, and turned off the lights.

"Everybody was just looking out the windows, trying not to be seen," Wilson said.

UCA spokesman Warwick Sabin said the campus' emergency alert system was activated about 9:40 p.m. Through e-mails and automated phone calls, students and faculty members on campus were advised to stay inside and lock their doors, Sabin said.

"UCA Police have initiated a tactical response to a reported shooting incident on campus,"the e-mail alert read. "Students, faculty, and staff are advised to lock classrooms and offices and prepare to take shelter."

The alert said to call 911 to report suspicious activity and to wait for further instructions from campus police.

Some students complained that they didn't receive the automated notifications. Wilson said she checked her e-mail at 10:15 p.m. and didn't see the alert.

Two hours after the shooting, students gathered outside near police lines wondering what had happened.

Arkansas' last fatal shooting on a college campus was on Aug. 28, 2000, when graduate student James Easton Kelly, 36, shot and killed his professor, John Locke, 67, in Locke's office on the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville campus and then committed suicide.

Information for this article was contributed by Andy Davis and Amy Upshaw of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.