Six people were killed and three wounded Monday when a gunman opened fire at a small religious college in Oakland.
Oakland City Councilman Larry Reid, who represents the area, told The
Times he was informed about the casualties by Oakland police officials,
who plan a 2 p.m. news conference.
A school official said the alleged gunman had been a nursing student at the college.
Pastor Jong Kim, who founded Oikos University about 10 years ago, told the
Oakland Tribune
he was unsure if the alleged shooter had been expelled from the school
or dropped out voluntarily. He said he heard about 30 gunshots while
remaining in his office for safety.
Lucas Garcia, a teacher at the school, told
KGO-TV
he heard a half-dozen shots in the middle of a lesson before someone
yelled that a someone had a gun. Garcia said there are a little more
than 100 students enrolled at the university, but not all were on campus
at the time. He said the school teaches the Bible, nursing and English.
The executive chancellor of the Oakland medical marijuana university
that was raided by federal agents Monday said she advised founder
Richard Lee, whose home also was raided, to stay away.
The properties raided Monday included the university, a museum at
17th and Broadway--where Lee recently relocated his dispensary after his
landlord received a warning letter from the U.S. attorney--and two
other locations Lee has rented.
A raid also was being conducted on the home of a friend of Lee's,
said Executive Chancellor Dale Sky Jones. Lee founded Oaksterdam as the
state's first cannabis-industry training school.
For South Carolina's unemployed, failing
or refusing a drug test after a job offer could mean the end to that
unemployment check. The SC House passed a bill that would allow employers to
contact the SC Department of Employment and Workforce if a prospective employee
fails or refuses a drug test.
The bill passed the House in late March by a vote of 70-24.
"You are not ready, able and available to be hired and go to
work," Aiken County Representative Thomas Young, Jr. argued. Young, a
Republican, co-authored the bill and argued on the floor that the
standard for drawing unemployment benefits is being ready to go to work right
away. "We shouldn't be paying unemployment benefits to someone that doesn't
meet that definition," said Young.
"It's a little bit insulting to those who have lost their
jobs for this body to suggest that they're unemployed because of drug use,"
Representative Joe Neal told the House. Neal brought up Governor Haley's
accusations that half of job applicants at the Savannah River nuclear plant had
failed drug tests, but SRS records showed that less than 1 percent had failed.
Democrats think Haley's misinformation led to the
unemployment drug testing bill.
The burden of paying for college is wreaking havoc on the finances of an unexpected demographic: senior citizens.
New research from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York shows that Americans 60 and older still owe about $36 billion in student
loans,
providing a rare window into the dynamics of student debt. More than 10
percent of those loans are delinquent. As a result, consumer advocates
say, it is not uncommon for Social Security checks to be garnished or
for debt collectors to harass borrowers in their 80s over student loans
that are decades old.
