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Terrorism suspected in car-and-knife attack at Ohio State

COLUMBUS, Ohio — A Somali-born Ohio State University student plowed his car into a group of pedestrians on campus and then got out and began stabbing people with a butcher knife Monday before he was shot to death by an officer. Police said they are investigating whether it was a terrorist attack.

Eleven people were hurt, one critically.

The attacker was identified as Abdul Razak Ali Artan. He was born in Somalia and was a legal permanent U.S. resident, according to a U.S. official who wasn't authorized to discuss the case and spoke on the condition of anonymity. The FBI joined the investigation.

The details emerged after a morning of confusion and conflicting reports, created in part by a series of tweets from the university warning that there was an "active shooter" on campus and that students should "run, hide, fight." The warning was prompted by what turned out to be police gunfire.

Numerous police vehicles and ambulances converged on the 60,000-student campus, and authorities blocked off roads. Students barricaded themselves inside offices and classrooms, piling chairs and desks in front of doors, before getting the all-clear an hour and a half later.

Ohio State University police Chief Craig Stone said the assailant deliberately drove his small gray Honda over a curb outside an engineering classroom building and then began knifing people. A campus officer nearby because of a gas leak arrived on the scene and shot the driver in less than a minute, Stone said.

Angshuman Kapil, a graduate student, was outside Watts Hall when the car barreled onto the sidewalk.

"It just hit everybody who was in front," he said. "After that everybody was shouting, 'Run! Run! Run!'"

Student Martin Schneider said he heard the car's engine revving.

"I thought it was an accident initially until I saw the guy come out with a knife," Schneider said, adding the man didn't say anything when he got out.

Most of the injured were hurt by the car, and at least two were stabbed, officials said. One had a fractured skull.

Columbus police Chief Kim Jacobs, asked at a news conference whether authorities were considering the possibility it was a terrorist act, said: "I think we have to consider that it is."

Rep. Adam Schiff, of California, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said that while the bloodshed is still under investigation, it "bears all of the hallmarks of a terror attack carried out by someone who may have been self-radicalized."

"Here in the United States, our most immediate threat still comes from lone attackers that are not only capable of unleashing great harm but are also extremely difficult, and in some cases, virtually impossible to identify or interdict," he said.

Ohio State's student newspaper, The Lantern, ran an interview in August with a student named Abdul Razak Artan, who identified himself as a Muslim and a third-year logistics management student who had just transferred from Columbus State in the fall.

He said he was looking for a place to pray openly and worried about how he would be received.

"I was kind of scared with everything going on in the media. I'm a Muslim, it's not what media portrays me to be," he told the newspaper. "If people look at me, a Muslim praying, I don't know what they're going to think, what's going to happen. But I don't blame them. It's the media that put that picture in their heads."

In recent months, federal law enforcement officials have raised concerns about online extremist propaganda that encourages knife and car attacks, which are easier to pull off than bombings.

The Islamic State group has urged sympathizers online to carry out lone-wolf attacks in their home countries with whatever weapons are available to them.

In September, a 20-year-old Somali-American stabbed 10 people at a St. Cloud, Minnesota, shopping mall before being shot to death by an off-duty officer. Authorities said he asked some of his victims if they were Muslim. In the past few years, London and other cities also have seen knife attacks blamed on extremists.

Neighbors say Artan was always polite and attended daily prayer services at a mosque on the city's west side.

Leaders of Muslim organizations and mosques in the Columbus area condemned the attacks while cautioning people against jumping to conclusions or blaming a religion or an ethnicity.

"It is particularly heartbreaking to see this random act of violence come to this community I hold so dear," said Nicole Ghazi, who is active in Islamic organizations and is an Ohio State graduate.

Surveillance photos showed Artan in the car by himself just before the attack, but investigators are looking into whether anyone else was involved, the campus police chief said.

The bloodshed came as students were returning to classes following the Thanksgiving break and Ohio State's football victory over rival Michigan that brought more than 100,000 fans to campus on Saturday.

"There were several moments of chaos," said Rachel LeMaster, who works in the engineering college. "We barricaded ourselves like we're supposed to since it was right outside our door and just hunkered down."

LeMaster said she and others were eventually led outside the building and she saw a body on the ground.

Classes were canceled for the rest of the day.

The officer who gunned the attacker down was identified as 28-year-old Alan Horujko, a member of the force for just under two years.

The initial tweet from Ohio State emergency officials went out around 10 a.m. and said: "Buckeye Alert: Active Shooter on campus. Run Hide Fight. Watts Hall. 19th and College." University President Michael Drake said the warning was issued after shots were heard on campus.

"Run, hide, fight" is standard protocol for active shooter situations. It means: Run away if possible; get out of view; or try to disrupt or incapacitate the shooter if your life is in imminent danger.

4:30 p.m.

Authorities say the officer who killed an attacker at Ohio State University was a university police officer who'd been on the job for less than two years.

Department of Public Safety Director Monica Moll identified the officer as 28-year-old Alan Horujko. She said he started on the Ohio State police force in January 2015.

Ohio State Police Chief Craig Stone said it was fortunate there was a nearby gas leak that the officer had gone to investigate. Stone said it helped position Horujko to respond to the attack so quickly.

Those injured in the attack included an Ohio State faculty member, four graduate students and three undergrads.

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 4:10 p.m.

A director of public safety says a man who drove a car into pedestrians and began stabbing people at Ohio State was a student at the school.

Ohio State Department of Public Safety Director Monica Moll also identified the now-deceased suspect as Abdul Razak Ali Artan.

A U.S. official earlier told The Associated Press that he was born in Somalia and living in the United States as a legal permanent resident. The official wasn't authorized to publicly discuss details of the ongoing case and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

Authorities say Artan was shot to death by a police officer Alan Horujko Monday morning shortly after he drove up onto a curb into pedestrians, got out of the car and began stabbing people with a butcher knife.

Nine people were injured, including one critically.

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3 p.m.

A police chief says authorities are looking into whether the attack at Ohio State University was related to terrorism.

Columbus Police Chief Kim Jacobs was asked at a news conference Monday afternoon whether authorities were considering the possibility that it was a terror attack.

Jacobs says, "I think we have to consider that it is."

Authorities say a man purposely plowed his car over a curb and into pedestrians on Monday morning before jumping out of the car and attacking people with a butcher knife. A police officer who was nearby because of an earlier gas leak was on the scene in a minute and shot and killed the attacker.

The FBI and other agencies joined the investigation.

Authorities say nine people were hurt, one of them critically.

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1:10 p.m.

Ohio State police say the attacker on campus purposely drove over a curb and into pedestrians and then got out of the vehicle and began stabbing people with a butcher knife.

Police Chief Craig Stone spoke early Monday afternoon at a news conference.

Authorities also said police believe that there was only one attacker. Ohio State said earlier that the suspect had been shot and killed.

Authorities said later that it doesn't appear that the suspect used a gun in the attack.

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12:50 p.m.

A spokesman for Ohio State University says a suspect in an attack on campus that injured at least eight people has been shot and killed.

Ben Johnson also said Monday that injuries in the attack included stab wounds and being struck by a vehicle.

A law enforcement official told The Associated Press that the suspect is believed to have initially struck people with a car before beginning to stab victims. There was no indication that the suspect shot anyone. The official wasn't authorized to discuss an ongoing investigation by name and spoke on condition of anonymity.

The details started to emerge after a morning of confusion and conflicting reports that began with the university issuing tweets warning students that there was an "active shooter" on campus near the engineering building and that they should "run, hide, fight."

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12:15 p.m.

A spokesman for Ohio State University says injuries in the attack on campus included stab wounds and being struck by a vehicle.

Ben Johnson said Monday that there were also other injuries that were being evaluated.

He says campus will remain open, but classes will be canceled for the rest of the day.

The university had sent a series of tweets at around 10 a.m. Monday saying there was an active shooter on campus and that students should run, hide or fight. About an hour and a half later, the university said a shelter-in-place warning had been lifted and the scene was secure.

At least eight people have been sent to hospitals.

The fate of any suspect or suspects wasn't immediately clear.

UPDATE: Shelter in place has been lifted. Law enforcement will continue to have visible presence on campus. LIVE: Columbus police responded to an attack on The Ohio State University's campus. The suspect is dead. Columbus Fire confirm 1 person was critical, 7 were stable, and 1 person was evaluated at the scene.

Posted by WSYX ABC 6 on Monday, November 28, 2016

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12:05 p.m.

Hospital officials say eight patients they received from the scene of a reported attack at Ohio State University have non-life-threatening injuries.

The eight patients were split among OSU Wexner Medical Center, OhioHealth Grant Medical Center and OhioHealth Riverside Methodist Hospital.

The university had warned students in a series of tweets earlier Monday that there was an active shooter on campus and that they should run, hide or fight. About an hour and a half later, the university said a shelter-in-place warning had been lifted and the scene was secure.

The fire department had earlier said that seven people had been taken to hospitals.

It wasn't immediately clear if a suspect or suspects in the attack were among the people sent to the hospitals.

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11:35 a.m.

Ohio State University says a shelter-in-place warning has been lifted and the scene is secure following reports of an active shooter and at least seven people injured.

Ohio State tweeted Monday morning that all classes would be canceled for the rest of the day.

The university had warned students in a series of tweets earlier Monday that there was an active shooter on campus and that they should run, hide or fight.

The Columbus Fire Department says seven people had been taken to the hospital. It says two of those people were in stable condition. It didn't have details on the other five.

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10:45 a.m.

The fire department says seven people have been sent to the hospital after an active shooter was reported at Ohio State University.

The Columbus Fire Department says two of those people are in stable condition. It had no information on the other five people.

Ohio State University warned students in a series of tweets Monday morning that there was an active shooter on campus and that they should run, hide or fight.

One tweet says: "Buckeye Alert: Active Shooter on campus. Run Hide Fight. Watts Hall. 19th and College." Watts Hall is a materials science and engineering building.

It is not immediately clear if the shooting is still in progress.

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This story has been corrected to show that the fire department said seven people have been sent to the hospital after a report of an active shooter at Ohio State University, not that they said seven people have been sent to the hospital after a shooting at Ohio State University.

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10:30 a.m.

Ohio State University is telling students there's an active shooter on campus and they should "Run Hide Fight."

Ohio State's official Twitter page retweeted a post from OSU Emergency Management saying there is an active shooter on campus in Columbus on Monday morning.

The tweet says: "Buckeye Alert: Active Shooter on campus. Run Hide Fight. Watts Hall. 19th and College." Watts Hall is a materials science and engineering building.

"Run, hide, fight" is standard protocol for active shooter situations. It means: Run, evacuate if possible; Hide, get silently out of view; or Fight, as a last resort, take action to disrupt or incapacitate the shooter if your life is in imminent danger.

A Columbus police dispatcher declined to comment on the reports, but police vehicles were seen at the scene.