By Justin Roberts
News Editor, ‘10
Visiting prospective transfer students were treated to a special tour on Thursday, June 4th.  Student-employees for the Department of Admission showed them the Hudson Room, Rec. Center, library and the Jersey City Bomb Squad investigating a suspicious safe under Saint Peter’s stern gaze at East Campus.
The safe was found in Millennium Hall but Residence Life confirmed that it was not school property.  After an examination, the police determined that the safe’s contents were non explosive and disposed of it.
Early that morning, the Jersey City Police received an anonymous call stating that a bomb hidden somewhere on campus would explode.  According to Art Youmans, Director of Campus Safety, the call came from a Jersey City pay phone that was not visible to a Closed Circuit TV Neighborhood Watch camera.  No other information has been uncovered about the caller or a possible motive.
Officers were dispatched to the campus where they announced themselves to Campus Security and searched all of college’s premises.  It is believed that the safe was abandoned by a freshman last May.  No evidence of an explosive was found anywhere on campus.
For most of the morning, few of the college’s employees knew why the police bomb squad was on campus.  Student employees giving tours gave prospective students and their families a thrill by taking them right past the officers investigating the threat.  When the prospectives and their parents asked about police presence, Admission employees were unable to answer their questions.  Neither police nor security staff stopped them from moving freely around east campus.
“I wasn’t sure whether we were in danger or not,” said Ed Hennessy, a student who was visiting the library that day.  “I saw the cars and all the cops when i got on campus at 9 this morning and had absolutely no idea what was going on.  Nobody did.”
At least one employee was angered by the Administration’s silence.  “I think it was ridiculous.  You’d think they’d tell us why the cops were searching the campus,” he said.  “Its just one more example of the disregard the administrators have for students and staff.”  The employee asked to remain anonymous.
Most employees and students took it in stride, though.  “If we had been in danger, they would have told us.  Its too big a liability and Saint Peter’s is a community,” said senior Jonathan Carrillo.
Most of the campus was inspected before 9, leaving only the East campus to inspect. The police determined that there was no danger on the West side of Kennedy but were unable to say if the anonymous caller had serious intentions or was merely playing a dangerous prank.
This was the second bomb threat of 2009.