Loaded magazine found in backpack in Weiss Hall

The magazine belonged to a student.

A loaded magazine was found in a backpack that had been left after class Wednesday in Weiss Hall, said Ray Betzner, assistant vice president for University Communications.

Around 1:30 p.m., Wednesday, a professor picked up a backpack in a classroom which had been left after class and found a loaded magazine inside, but no gun, Betzner said. The professor immediately contacted Temple Police who were able to identify the student who the backpack belonged to.

The male student claimed that the backpack and the magazine were his and he produced a permit to carry a weapon matching the ammunition, Betzner said. The student has been referred for violating the Student Code of Conduct which prohibits ammunition from being brought on campus.

No TU Alert or Advisory was issued because officials concluded that at no time was there a “threat to students or campus,” Betzner said.

These findings disprove earlier rumors on social media that a gun had been found in or near Gladfelter Hall – the same place where a threat referring to the 1999 Columbine High School shooting was found scrawled in a bathroom in March. Another Columbine-related message was found in Gladfelter on Tuesday, but officials said they are not viewing it as a threat.

Sean Carlin can be reached at sean.carlin@temple.edu or on Twitter @SeanCarlin84. 

12 Comments

  1. Sent up for a referral for having a magazine in a bag. May I remind everyone that the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun? Psychopathic killers will always find a way to get a gun and do their evil. Taking away our natural right to self-defense just because we've stepped on a college campus only means we are totally at these monsters' mercy. It's time to end campus gun bans.

    • I’m glad you can’t have a gun on campus. Really, truly glad. Sure, in the extremely rare circumstance of a mass shooter it sucks. But it’s far more likely that you, or somebody near you, will get upset and a normal argument/fight/petty crime will turn into a shooting. Anyway, thanks for parroting some shit you heard and didn't think about. It disgusts me that you weren't booted from the school for that sort of weapons violation. You shouldn't be allowed to graduate. You should be gone.

      • Nonsense, look at places in this country with high legal gun ownership rates. These kinds of absurd cowboy shootout situations you describe have never been shown to actually happen when gun laws get more lax. People are not that eager to kill each other or be killed themselves, or go to jail. And finally, why are you calling for me to be expelled? What did I do? I was not the guy with the magazine. All I’m doing is expressing my opinion here. Or would you like to repeal the First Amendment as well as the Second?

        • That’s a flat out lie.

          Gun ownership is positively correlated to homicide.

          But hey, thank you for the kind reminder that you gun nuts are disgusting, dishonest assholes without a single shred of respect for the truth.

          • And thank you for reminding us that most (not all, but certainly most) liberals are utterly incapable of having a political disagreement without resorting to ad hominem insults and harsh words. That’s not coming from my side, buddy.

            Chicago has the strongest gun control in the country. If gun control makes you feel so safe, please move there, and leave the rights of Pennsylvanians alone.

            http://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/gun-control-myths-realities

        • Okay, so you cited a right-wing think tank to justify your bullshit, and like most dishonest right-wing assholes you pretended that the Cato institute (which is a far-right libertarian think-tank) was non-partisan.

          Here’s an actual non-partisan source: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/hicrc/firearms-research/guns-and-death/

          I get it: you like guns. You think that we’d all be safer if we all had nuclear bombs and sarin gas on us at all times. You’re an idiot.

          Quit polluting the world with your nonsensical bullshit and your flagrant lies.

          • By all means, continue to rage and call names. It shows your true colors quite nicely.

            This idea of “more guns equals more violence” is laughable: Of course it’s easier to commit a crime if you have a weapon. Why don’t you tell us about how safe Chicago is, with the strictest gun control in the country? Why don’t you tell us about how the DC handgun ban did nothing to curb violence? Why don’t you tell us about how every person in Kennesaw, Georgia is required to own a gun, and there is very low crime there? Why don’t you tell us about how safe Vermont, Maine and Montana are, with their lax gun laws? You can manipulate statistics to show almost anything – it’s real-world examples that matter. In places where law-abiding citizens own guns, you are safer.

            But I promise if you’re ever in my town and I see you being robbed, I’ll respect your values and not use my rifle to protect you, and I’ll make sure my friends do the same. Lol.

    • This particular “good guy” apparently can’t keep track of his ammunition. Thanks, I’ll take my chances without his protection.

      • Don’t misunderstand, this was a stupid mistake of him to make, but the discipline should be for leaving ammo lying around, not for having it in the first place. Our Second Amendment rights, which exist to allow us to defend ourselves, should not magically end on campus. How many mass shootings happen at shooting ranges, police conventions, NRA rallies? Not a lot. Psychopaths want to do their shooting somewhere where they know they won’t get shot back at.

        • I’m sure we could trade links to web sites all day (I’d start with the one about the recent shooting of the military special forces guy at a shooting range) and not convince each other. There are so many guns out there right now, I don’t even know what the best policy would be. I don’t want to take your gun for hunting or self-protection or whatever, but I do believe your gun would more likely be used in an accidental shooting or against you than to protect you. I don’t buy the slippery slope argument against gun owner registration or a ban on high capacity weapons and magazines. And most of all, I can’t resist pointing out the irony in arguing “bad guys will find ways to get guns” in response to an article about a licensed owner leaving his loaded magazine in a backpack in a random classroom. Main point: I, for one, am glad guns are banned on campus.

          • Well you’re certainly entitled to your opinion, and I do understand where you’re coming from even if I don’t necessarily agree. I would point out the fact that, if anything, this foolish error of leaving his loaded mag lying around only goes to show how easy it would be for a bad guy to have gotten it. You are correct that I could have phrased my initial post better – it was terrible of him to do this, but my thought was along the lines of the fact that he was referred, not for the safety violation, but for having it at all. But you’re right, I should have worded my post more thoughtfully.

            I’ll leave everyone with this one observation: If a shooter walked into your classroom, and somebody pulled out a gun they weren’t supposed to have and stopped the threat before he could do harm, no matter your view on guns, you would not be sorry he had his gun that day. That is (one of the) reason(s) for the Second Amendment.

          • That is absolutely true. If a psychopath invaded my classroom and a student pulled a gun he wasn’t supposed to have and averted a tragedy, I would indeed be very grateful.

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