Student’s hand injured in stabbing at dorms

Christina M. Rafael

Sports Editor

A student was stabbed in the hand during an altercation at the Shasta College dormitories on Saturday Feb. 3 around 12:18 a.m. The student was treated at a local hospital.

No other people were injured, but there was car damage to one person’s vehicle who was involved.

It is unclear as to why this altercation occurred but alcohol was reportedly a major cause in the incident according to students who witnessed the altercation. The stabbing occurred in the boy’s parking lot after a group of people came to the dorms to confront a resident.

“I heard a lot of noise from my room and I went to the outside stairs [facing the parking lot] to see what was going on,” said a resident Steven Baumeister, “there was about 10-15 people in the parking lot yelling back and forth, it was really loud.”

After the yelling began the head resident was called and attempted to break up the two groups. After unsuccessfully being able to break up the fight many of the male dorm residents rushed outside. The Shasta College Campus Security and Redding Police Department were called immediately. The outside group left.

“Everybody rushed outside to help him [when he was stabbed]…everyone,” said resident Tyler Dunbar.

After the stabbing the resident helped the wounded man as best as they could.

“He had a bunch of paper towels on it, it was gross, there was lots of blood” said Baumeister.

Redding Police Department and Security talked with all people involved in the incident.

“I saw him [the stabbed man] come in with the head resident and I said ‘what’s going on?’, I also asked if it happened a lot”, said resident David Hubbard, “she said ‘no, it’s bizarre.’”

The dorms have not had problems like this in recent years.

“Something like this hasn’t happened since I’ve been here,” said Coordinator of Student Housing Steve Cross, “it’s the most serious thing that’s happened since I’ve been here”.

The man is now healed and OK. Reportedly the visitors were let into the eastern part of the dorm building and then later fled to the parking lot, it unclear as to how they got in, some possibilities are a propped door (a problem the dorms face regularly) or someone let them in unknowingly.

The dorms asked for a closed circuit TV system to monitor activity last year but were denied due to the estimated cost of $49,000. Cross has submitted a new proposal with a lower estimate that would total approximately $20,000.

The system would be used to monitor hallways, doors, and parking lots to prevent things like this from happening in the future.

“Our goal is for the residents [in the dorms] to be safe, secure, and comfortable. When people come and do something like this it’s frustrating for all the residents,” said Cross.