The University of Alabama Police Department were aware of an incident involving an armed gunman on campus for nearly 20 minutes before the University informed students, faculty and staff of the situation Tuesday morning.
At 11:09 a.m., UAPD received calls about a gunman firing a shot at the Phi Delta Theta fraternity house. According to a Tuscaloosa Police Department press release, UAPD responded to the call within two minutes, but the suspect had already fled the scene.
According to the press release, 61-year-old Eugene Kelly of Tuscaloosa became involved in an altercation with two family members, employees at the fraternity house, before firing a shot at one of them.
UA students were notified of the situation around 11:30 a.m. via the PA system on campus and UA Alert emergency emails, texts and phone calls.
UA spokeswoman Cathy Andreen would not confirm or deny that any University buildings were placed on lockdown before the all clear was issued around noon.
When asked why it isn’t procedure to lock down campus after any shots are fired, Andreen said each situation is unique.
“Emergency communications are provided based on information determined by first responders,” Andreen said. “In this situation, UAPD determined that the incident was specific to one location and the UA community was provided appropriate information through a UA Alert.”
At 11:14 a.m.—five minutes after UAPD received the call—TPD, unaware that the incident to which they were responding was related to an incident on campus, responded to a stabbing call in the 1100 block of E. 22nd Ave., where 61-year-old Kelly is believed to have stabbed a 28-year-old female victim. Kelly again fled the scene before wrecking his vehicle on University Boulevard over Kicker Road.
“According to witnesses, the suspect got out of the vehicle and attempted to jump off the bridge but bystanders held him down,” TPD spokesman Brent Blankley said. “TPD officers arrived on scene and placed the suspect into custody. After the suspect was in custody UAPD notified TPD about an incident that occurred on campus involving the suspect.”
Kelly and the victim were both taken to DCH with non-life-threatening injuries.
Two members of the Phi Delta Theta fraternity said the shooter was the husband of the house’s main cook with a history of familial altercations.
“She’s the main cook and he comes to help her sometimes,” said Brett Machen, who was in the house at the time of the incident. “They were supposedly getting a divorce. They’ve had some problems, and he got laid off two weeks ago.”
Blaine Salem, another Phi Delta Theta, said what Machen told the media about the couple was true, and that the wife of the alleged shooter had threatened to call the police after altercations with him before.
“They were getting divorced, they argued all the time,” Salem said, “They were in there yelling at each other every day.”
Machen said he thought one or two shots were fired, but didn’t hear them upstairs. Even so, he said he felt safe because of the quick response of police forces.
“I walked down and as soon as I got out of the elevator there were like 10 cops pointing guns and they told me to go outside,” Machen said. “I felt pretty secure with all the cops here.”
Stephen N. Dethrage and Ashley Chaffin contributed to this report.
