UPDATE: HARVARD SHOOTING: Justin Cosby, Student, Dies

UPDATE 05.19
The student who was shot on Harvard's campus Monday has died, the Boston Globe reports. The victim has been identified as a Salem State College student.

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UPDATE: The Boston Globe adds that the victim, a student, was shot in the abdomen and that the police are looking for several assailants.

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The Harvard Crimson is reporting that an unidentified man was shot on the campus of Harvard University just before 5 p.m. this afternoon.

The Crimson reports:

The victim was bleeding but still conscious, according to Dental School student Jared M. Sprague, who says he helped support the victim after the shooting. Sprague said the victim appeared to be "college-aged."

Sergeant James DeFrancesco of the Cambridge Police Department said around 6 p.m. that he did not know whether the victim was a Harvard student.

The victim was being treated at a nearby hospital, Sgt. DeFrancesco told reporters.

The Boston Globe reports that the victim was shot at the entrance to Kirkland House dormitory and collapsed on Dunster Street.

Story continues below

According to the Globe:

The Cambridge and Harvard police departments were still searching in around Kirkland House, one of Harvard's 12 undergraduate houses, for the assailant, according to a message sent to the Harvard community. University officials asked students to remain where they are and report unusual activity to the Harvard Police Department.

This email was sent to faculty and students:

Kirkland House Students and Tutors,

We have been informed that a shooting took place minutes ago in J-Entry of the Annex.

The Annex where the police are proceeding with an investigation has been cordoned off.

We ask everyone to cooperate with the police and staff in the hours ahead. We will apprise everyone of further developments.

Please be patient and use the dining hall, the basement, or the JCR for the next few hours until you can return to your rooms.

Anyone with any information should talk to the Harvard Police immediately.

At this time, identities of the victim and perpetrator(s) are unknown.

Comments

[whohortonehears2]

junior college looking better by the day...

[gle helle]

I'm sure you'll fit right in.

[bynddrvn5]

Poor Harvard. Like they need another black eye after Dubya!

[mogeorge]

Wasn't he a Yalie?

[Bubbas]

Dubya didn't go to Harvard...

[profco]

Dubya went to Yale.

[cdnnewsjunky]

Harvard? When people at Harvard are getting shot, I think it's time to start admitting there might be a problem with guns in America!

[AgentMacGyver]

Yale became much safer after a student was murdered in a drive-by. Plenty of unsavory characters in Cambridge too.

[redsongia]

It's true. There is often alot of petty crime and muggings around Harvard. More people out of work will always mean more crime. This is a problem at Duke also, where people in the city around Duke perceive their students as "rich" even though it's often not the case.

[ChangeNow]

Massachusetts has the most restrictive gun laws in the country.

[Leifrakur]

And, next to Hawaii, Massachusetts also has the lowest state firearm death rate.

[JNagarya]

And the vast majority of MA citizens WANT it that way.

Exactly as the vast majority of citizens nationally want strict gun control laws.

And the whine from "responsible gun owners" who OPPOSE gun control laws are IRresponsible loons.

[constitutional 1]

OR there is a problem with crime

[Menckenlite]

You think guns, not drugs are the problem? Think again. The southwestern US is being invaded by Mexican drug cartels whose main base is in Atlanta. Read beyond the HuPo. In eastern Mass alone three "former" or "retired" cops were arrested for selling drugs in May 2009. This is a national problem ignored by spineless politicians who get campaign cash from the money launderers.

[tydicea]

This beginning to be an epidemic....where is anyone safe these days? Not even in church.

[PavePusher]

And this is new since when? "Safe" has never been the human condition. Ever. Deal with it. You are the ONLY person responsible for your actions and safety.

[provgrays]

Guns are too available and that is the reality behind all of the high blown and chest thumping rhetoric about the Second Amendment.

[FairTalk]

I doubt this is about guns.

[Bush-Rolled]

Then how was he shot?

[ChristianBernstein]

is it about Bush, eh?

[buckaroom]

Don't like guns? Don't buy one.

[BigFootJesus]

Don't like guns? Don't get shot by one. Numbskull.

[CC1]

It's the person who used the gun's problem actually.

[JulieCarol]

Don't allow people with severe mental problems to have guns. Problem solved.

[FairTalk]

Victim has been identified as an african american, who may be a student, but not at hervard. There may be witnesses. here is the best info so far...

http://www.huliq.com/1/81064/harvard-shooting-kirkland-house-reminder-fragility

Kirkland House is for undergrads, sophmore thru seniors, who were studying for upcoming finals.

[Doris]

wait...

"Today's shooting at Harvard University's Kirkland House reminds us of how fragile is human life and how less are our students protected."

is that good sentence structure? did somebody at Harvard write this?

[an observer3]

What happened to settling differences with a talk or a good fistfight. Gun violence seems to be everywhere.

[redsongia]

I doubt it was about settling differences, rather stealing someone's money.

[ultrabop]

Not, I'm sure, the first time that someone has been shot within the confines of Harvard Yard. Why exactly is this incident, devoid of detail or intention, worthy of a headline?

[FairTalk]

My guess is that since Virginia Tech any shooting at a college gets into the news, and since Obama and many of his appointees went to harvard, this story has grabbed a spot on HP.

[Jakealoper]

My feelings too. People get shot all the time, as well as Mass is a bastion of gun control.

[SarahSNYC]

Kirkland House is not in Harvard Yard.

[provgrays]

bop,

It's worthy of a headline because a person was shot.

[twogunmojo]

how many people have been shot since the first of the year...and this story is special why.....

[annis]

We who have our children in colleges across the country want them to be safe. Thank you for your sane consideration and show of concern for our youth.

[FairTalk]

Parents with kids in college should DEMAND the same transparency in reporting crime that public police must do. Crime on campus is covered up, wake up, and insist that a law be passed so colleges cannot cover this up.

[Bob Chalfant]

Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms should be a convenience store, not a government agency.

[iheardthisbefore]

Troll alert....
Troll alert...
NRA Troll alert....

[Jerry Pecks]

yeehaw!!! NOT.

[notyouraveragebear]

You sound like a Texan... are you a neighbor of the failed Pres. Bush?

[jimmyjones22]

I lol'd

[Jakealoper]

Gun control is hitting your target too. Well, you actually have the sensible view. The price of a couple cartridges is nothing compared to jail, court, legal, police, prison, rehab, welfare costs as well as harm to future victims when comparing a dead robbery suspect to arresting him.

[FairTalk]

We have heard on the radio that the police are not sure if there are perps, or if the wound was self inflicted.

[jhw22]

Seems fairly easy to determine...

Jennifer

[FairTalk]

Police in Cambridge are notorious for putting out false information. We have violence all the time, both Harvard and MIT cover this up, they want to make sure prospective students are not scared away, and the powers that be in Cambridge do not want property values to be affected by reporting violence. This has been an ongoing issue, and several years ago we neighbors circulated a petition for more bike police and communbity policing, which Cambridge City Council has been stalling on forever.

[jimmyjones22]

kind of hard to shoot yourself in the stomach, but is a natural target for a shooter

[AuntiepoppyCock]

I hope the victim will be OK.

What is going on in this world? Ivy league drive by... Maybe a lovers quarrel? Psycho college republican? The Janitor? Who did it?

[TainoBoy]

At Harvard University; this is fabrication. We all known Harvard is to prestige for rednecks and their pet guns.

[Duke1225]

This is such a ridiculous statement. This is why gun control needs to be federal. Boston may not allow guns, but obviously the shooters got guns from some place where it is legal. Even, if they stole it from someone who bought it legally, the gun started out being bought legally. This is why there is such a problem in Mexico because they get the guns legally here. A report,

which was obtained by The Washington Post, found that 10 states, including Virginia, supplied 57 percent of the guns that were recovered in crimes in other states in 2007. The 38-page report is based on an analysis of annual crime-gun data compiled by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The analysis tracks guns used in crimes back to the retailers that first sold
them.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/story/2008/12/05/ST2008120500767.html

[triplbee]

Sadly, we will not wean ourselves from our gun addiction any time soon. It just won't happen.

[glarblBlarbl]

At least not until we end Prohibition...

Again.

[fignew]

Yea, you're right.

But before we make more federal gun laws, we should make drug laws federal. That way there won't be any more illegal drugs!

Doesn't work for drugs, doesn't work for alcohol, doesn't work for people (illegal aliens), why would it work for guns?

[GetoffMylawn]

Everywhere there is a shooting, there is a gun.

[victorsays]

Wow, that is enlightening.

[jimmyjones22]

ever see a gun shoot itself?

[3rdpartypatriot]

Everywhere there is a shooting, there is a victim of bad parenting.

-3pp

[wadenelson1]

Well, after GWB devalued an MBA from Harvard to near worthlessness we can probably expect more of this sort of thing.

[rob2007]

Yale.

[OverIt]

I wish we could disown him, but Bush DID go to Harvard for Business School.

[LaurieLee]

He went to Yale undergrad.

[Just2stressed]

Bush went to Yale.

[Colmore]

He also attended Harvard. He obviously did not STUDY there, just attended.

[Matt Newman]

no, he got an MBA from Harvard after Yale.

[Matt Newman]

No, he went to Harvard after Yale.

[OverIt]

He went to Yale undergrad. Harvard Business.

[victorsays]

He went to Yale for Undergrad where he joins that gay club called Skulls and Bones. He went to Harvard for his MBA. He is the only US president with an MBA.

MBA also started the Financial Crisis. Moral of the story is MBA sucks and MBA ruined this country, from the Presidents on down to the trader on Wall Street.

MBA will never be the same.

[bccmeteorites]

I've been saying for several years now that a degree from the Harvard and Yale schools especially their business models are no better than an education at a low ranking 2 year school, but they're gaining lots of ground on the 4 month trade school degree business. I know lots of people will take issue with my assessment but truly anybody can run an economy, a business, or a bank into the ground without having to get a fake overpriced education to do it. The main difference is it takes Harvard and Yale graduates several more years to do it, even decades.

[TainoBoy]

People from Yale and Harvard control our government. DUH!

[ultrabop]

The difference being that an Ivy League pedigree gives one access to power and money. It has nothing to do with knowledge. Bush was the tragic end game to that scenario but he may have not only destroyed the Republican party but also the cache of an Ivy League education.

We have much to thank Bush for. Unless the world comes to an end in this downward spiral of hate-mongering and greed.

[ChristianBernstein]

you can always tell a Harvard man but you cannot tell him much.