Editor of Yeti Newsletter Arrested

April 18, 2007

Some Colorado campuses are raising security measures in the wake of Monday’s massacre at Virginia Tech and on the eve of the eighth anniversary of bloodshed at Columbine High School.

The University of Colorado, the University of Northern Colorado and Boulder High School were investigating incidents Tuesday related to threats and potential disturbances.

CU campus police arrested a student for investigation of interfering with staff members and students after he engaged in a heated discussion with classmates over the Virginia Tech rampage and said that he “would be capable of killing 32 people,” Cmdr. Brad Wiesley said.

Max Karson, 21, was booked into the Boulder County Jail on Tuesday evening after an afternoon interview, the commander said.

Students in the journalism course where the discussion took place told CU officers that they had become fearful about attending the class Thursday, Wiesley said.

The witnesses told police that Karson said in the discussion that he was angry enough to kill people, that the conditions in the classroom were making him angry, that the faults of CU would make him angry enough to kill 32 people, and, “if anyone in here says they’ve never been so angry that you wanted to kill 32 people, you’re lying.”

Karson drew the attention of campus administrators last fall when fellow students complained that a satirical newsletter he published, the Yeti Newsletter, was offensive to women.

At Boulder High, Principal Bud Jenkins informed parents by e- mail of three threats made concerning April 20, 1999, the eighth anniversary of the Columbine High School rampage that left 15 people dead. The first graffiti message was found scrawled in a bathroom just before spring break. It read: “Everyone Dies April 19.”

On Monday, two students told administrators they had seen similar statements in the boys locker room and another on a work desk.

University of Northern Colorado President Kay Norton sent e-mails to students Tuesday letting them know that police will be “highly visible” at the school’s University Center today for Foreign Language Day.

Norton said UNC had received an anonymous threat several days ago related to the event. Authorities suspect the threat came from a high school student who has been banned from the campus, Norton said.by Hector Gutierrez, Rocky Mountain News