SVSU Announces Suspect Arrested in Social Media Threat

A male student has been charged with disturbing the peace by making threats through the social media messaging app Yik Yak against black students at MI Technological University, officials said on Friday.

Tech’s Department of Public Safety has begun an investigation and is working with Yik Yak to uncover additional information. The student, whose name was not released Friday, is out on bond and will be arraigned Monday on a charge of disturbing the peace, according to a release from the university.

Yik Yak tells police they must generally provide a subpoena, court order or search warrant to obtain information about its users, but in an emergency the company may provide details without those legal instruments.

The post threatens the lives of African Americans.

MI Tech, a university with about 7,000 students on the western side of the Upper Peninsula, sent a campus-wide notification of the threat on Thursday.

Hunter M. Park, a 19-year-old student at the Missouri University of Science and Technology, was arrested for allegedly posting threats on the social media app against University of Missouri students and faculty, the University of Missouri student paper, The Maneater, reported.

The school’s department of public safety says it addresses all threats with the utmost seriousness. Police are in communication with Yik Yak to try to find out the person behind the message.

According to University President Glenn Mroz, the threat was direct at members of “Michigan Tech’s black community”. “It’s time we watch out for one another”.

School officials were quick to offer counseling at the Center for Diversity and Inclusion to anyone who needed it.