UNT Dallas President Convenes Town Hall After Domestic Shooting On Campus: 'I Was Traumatized'
DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) - It is now a sad fact that unravelling relationships quite often put others at risk.
So a town hall on the Dallas campus of the University of North Texas convened Tuesday to hear concerns following a weekend shooting that injured a 41-year-old student.
According to police investigators, the shooting grew out of a domestic dispute surrounding a child custody exchange.
"I was traumatized," said UNT Dallas President Bob Mong. "I had a sense that our students, faculty and staff just wanted to talk and I was right."
While university leaders know the exchange and shooting could have happened anywhere, they say they are not backing away from the fact that violence visited their community and they felt it was important to hear their concerns.
"They had questions that were just general safety questions," said President Mong. "Some of it involved just reminding our university community of what we have in place." Some of those safety procedures include a fully staffed police department, escorts to the parking lot, or rides to the nearby DART light rail station.
"You don't plan for things like this to happen," added Biology student Darnell Davis. Davis says he supports the decision to have a town hall and was attending in the hope of hearing concerns and also sharing ideas.
And President Mong said he came away with several ideas, including locations that would benefit from additional lighting.
"It's historically been a very safe campus," said President Mong. "It's good to remind people of that. At the same time, we put up cameras, we have a large police force. You can't take anything for granted."