Posted by Andrew Shi
At 10:30 p.m. last Wednesday students near Jonsson tower overheard an unexpected commotion as several police squad cars and an ambulance rolled into the parking lot. The authorities were responding to a call about a man said to have been shot at Falstaffs.
The caller was the girlfriend of the man but police have abstained from disclosing the names of either.
According to SSPD Lt. Gregory Veitch the man who claimed he had been shot called his girlfriend who then called police. Lt. Veitch did not know if the girlfriend was a Skidmore student, and she was not present at the scene when police arrived.
"When the officers arrived and talked to the man, they found that he had smoked some type of substance and suffered from hallucinations that he had been shot in the leg," Veitch said.
Director of the Department of Campus Security Dennis Conway who helped direct the police and emergency personnel to Falstaffs says that police found the man alone in his vehicle.
The man, 25, is a former Skidmore student according to Conway. He received medical treatment but was not arrested.
In New York State in order for someone to be arrested for falsely reporting an incident they would have to have the intent of causing a public alarm by making the false report. "In this case the officers were unable to prove that the person intended for a large emergency response to be initiated," Lt. Veitch said. "Although that did in fact happen, the intent was missing."
As to what caused the hallucination, Veitch says that "we believe that he had been smoking bath salts." Bath salts are banned in New York.
The banned bath salts — not be confused with mineral bath salts used for bathing — contain MPDV, a psychoactive drug and is compared to synthetic marijuana.
Although no arrest was made, according to Conway there may very well be consequences from the school for the man. Conway and several other school officials are currently deliberating the situation. According to Conway they are in talks about banning the former student from Skidmore.