Arkansas State suspect decided not to shoot others

Once the incident started, Arkansas State University officials moved students to the west side of the Carl R. Reng Student Union and secured them. “He stated that he was going to come to the university and shoot other people but he realized that murder would be wrong, so he was going to kill himself”.

Police said Connie Hampton is a felon and she was in a home with several guns, which violates her probation. He also told an officer he “was seeing demons in the woods around his house”.

Now that the dust has settled, it appears as though Bartelt was not planning to harm anyone but himself. While talking with negotiators, he waved his gun and threatened to shoot the propane tank, the report said. He was dressed in a suicide vest in court Friday.

JONESBORO, Ark. (AP) – The first court appearance for the man accused of loading his pickup truck with a shotgun, gasoline and propane and driving onto a plaza at Arkansas State University, prompting a campuswide lockdown, is set for Friday afternoon.

Police arrested him about an hour after the incident began. “Officers in process of securing vehicle now”, the Jonesboro Police Department said on its Twitter feed, without providing further details.

In an early report out of the university, school administrators announced a campus-wide lockdown following reports that a man with a weapon had driven onto campus. He said from “time-to-time” Bartelt would get out of the truck and slosh gasoline on the truck or hold the shotgun to his chin. He eventually surrendered and no one was hurt.

On Thursday afternoon, Arkansas State University sent out an text urging students and staff to evacuate their student union, after a report of an active shooter. He ended the statement: “Together we rise; together we thrive”.

This booking photo released by the Craighead County Sheriff’s Office shows Brad Kenneth Bartelt, 47, who was arrested Thursday, Dec. 10, 2015, and charged with aggravated assault.

Also Friday, police released a report indicating the man charged in the standoff – 47-year-old Brad Kenneth Bartelt – said he initially meant to shoot others at the university but later made a decision to threaten only to take his own life.

ASU Chancellor Tim Hudson said during the news conference, “Our alert system worked”.