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UNC says armed, dangerous suspect arrested in another campus incident

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill initiated a temporary shelter-in-place order, which was subsequently lifted.
Posted at 11:14 PM, Sep 13, 2023

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill said Wednesday evening that a suspect considered to be armed and dangerous on its campus was apprehended by police. It's at least the second such incident where police have encountered an armed and dangerous person on that campus in recent weeks. 

The university issued an alert saying "A suspect has been arrested and is in custody related to today’s armed & dangerous person incident."

The campus was closed by 5 p.m. according to another alert from the university. 

Chapel Hill police said the suspect had outstanding warrants and identified him as 27-year-old Mickel Deonte Harris of Durham, North Carolina. 

Police said, "Harris was being sought in connection with an incident on UNC-Chapel Hill’s campus earlier this afternoon. UNC-Chapel Hill is leading the investigation of today’s incident."

There were no reports of anyone being shot or injured. 

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The arrest comes just weeks after another gunman shot and killed one faculty member on campus. 

In late August, authorities charged a University of North Carolina graduate student with first-degree murder in the fatal shooting of a faculty adviser, in an attack that caused a campus lockdown while police searched for the gunman.

Tailei Qi, 34, was accused of killing Zijie Yan inside a science building on the Chapel Hill campus. He was also charged with having a 9 mm handgun on educational property, according to a warrant for his arrest.