A former University of California, Los Angeles lecturer was arrested Tuesday after police say he emailed an 800-page manifesto and posted videos threatening violence against the school, The Guardian reports.
Matthew Harris, 31, was taken into custody after a standoff at his Boulder, Co., apartment complex ended peacefully. Harris, who had lectured in the philosophy department at UCLA, sent messages to members of the UCLA community saying he would “hunt” and kill a professor. UCLA officials canceled classes Tuesday and its police department tracked Harris to Boulder and reached out to law enforcement there.
The Los Angeles police chief said Harris was “potentially planning for a mass violence or shooting event at UCLA”. Last year, a University of California Irvine philosophy professor was granted a restraining order against Harris. Court documents show Harris sent emails to his mother threatening to “hunt” and “put bullets in her skull." Harris’ mother alerted the woman. Harris was previously placed on leave after he was accused of sending a video with “pornographic content to a student”, the student newspaper Daily Bruin reported. In social media posts, students were critical of the university’s communication about the issue. Some said they learned of the threat from student groups rather than campus officials.