A Temple sophomore was arrested Sunday morning at Temple Towers for pointing a fake handgun at a Temple police officer, according to Temple police reports.
At 6 a.m., two Temple police officers responded to a call from the residence hall on Cecil B. Moore Avenue between 12th and 13th streets.
Warren Atkins, 19, appeared to be suffering from excessive consumption of alcohol, according to the police report.
When the officers asked for his name, Atkins responded, “My name is like the diet,” according to Captain Robert M. Lowell, Commanding Officer of the Temple Police Investigations Unit. Atkins then pulled a fake gun from his jacket pocket and pointed it at the chest of one of the officers.
As one officer seized Atkins’s weapon by grabbing the slide across the top of the handgun, the other officer clutched Atkins’s wrist and handcuffed him. No other physical force was used, Lowell said.
“If you point a weapon at someone, it is automatically aggravated assault,” Lowell said. “The officer thought the intent was to shoot when [Atkins] pointed the weapon at his chest. The officer had two options when [Atkins] pointed the gun. He could have fired his weapon or taken other action. Fortunately, our officers were able to use alternate measures.”
Shortly after Atkins was cuffed, the two officers determined the handgun was actually a .25 caliber semiautomatic replica. The weapon looked, felt and weighed the same as a real weapon, according to Lowell. The replica handgun was also made of similar materials to that of a normal handgun. It was determined to be a fake by closely examining the handgun’s slide.
Subsequent to his arrest, Atkins was transported to Temple University Hospital and treated for excessive consumption of alcohol while in police custody.
Atkins was with aggravated assault, simple assault, possession of an instrument of crime, recklessly endangering another person and public drunkenness at a preliminary arraignment on Monday, according to the Philadelphia Court Records Service. He spent at least one night in prison before the arraignment. He was later released on $3,000 bail.
Atkins is awaiting a preliminary hearing scheduled for Oct. 12 at 9 a.m. at the 23rd Police District. He is being represented by a court-appointed lawyer from the Public Defenders Office. He could not be reached for comment
Editor in chief Lucas K. Murray contributed information to this story.
Christopher A. Vito can be reached at cvitox01@temple.edu.
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