No evidence of shooter at University of South Carolina campus library despite alert, spokesperson says
By Amanda Musa, CNN
(CNN) — There is no evidence of a shooter at the University of South Carolina’s campus library, a school spokesperson said Sunday, after a schoolwide alert about a shooter who had been reported to be on the Columbia campus.
“We received an unconfirmed report of an active shooter at the Thomas Cooper library,” a university spokesperson, Jeff Stensland, told CNN affiliate WIS-TV. “At this point, we have no injuries, and we have no confirmation that there actually was a shooter at the library.”
EMS crews are treating a couple of students for minor injuries that occurred during evacuation, the university said in an update.
The university issued its first alert just after 6:30 p.m. and followed up with a description of a possible suspect.
Around 7:10 p.m., another alert said there was no evidence of an active shooter, but police were still searching the area.
Authorities cleared the library floor by floor out of an abundance of caution, Stensland added.
It’s unclear what led to Sunday’s report at the University of South Carolina.
“There is an active investigation to determine the nature of the call,” Stensland told CNN.
Sunday’s incident comes hours after Villanova University in Pennsylvania received its second false active shooter report in a week.
“Radnor Township Police Department is on location at Villanova University Austin Hall for a reported active shooter,” police said in an X post Sunday morning. “Law enforcement has confirmed the call to be false.”
Thursday, both Villanova University and the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga were placed on lockdown because of reports of an active shooter. Authorities are investigating the Tennessee incident as a possible case of swatting, a law enforcement source previously told CNN.
Swatting is a dangerous criminal hoax in which a false report is made to police to lure them to a location, where they are led to believe a crime such as a mass shooting, an imminent bombing or hostage taking has happened.
This story has been updated with additional details.
The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2025 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
