State universities to arm police with assault rifles

Police departments at Arizona's three universities plan to arm their officers with military-style assault rifles within the next year, officials said Tuesday.

The new rifles would give campus police officers long-range shooting capabilities, allowing them to hit targets at the end of long hallways or atop tall buildings, officials said.

Arizona State University will be the first of the three schools to use the weapons. Officers there will be trained to use the rifles in the next few months, said ASU police spokesman Cmdr. Jim Hardina.

Officers will undergo 40 hours of training before using the weapons.

"We don't want to just throw rifles out there," Hardina said.

Eight officers at the University of Arizona will get similar training before a rifle program launches there in four to five months, officials said. Northern Arizona University officials said a rifle program was in the works, although a specific start date was not immediately available.

ASU has bought four of the new rifles at $700 each, and is looking to find money to purchase four more. One challenge the department is facing: finding ammunition for the rifles. Increased military operations mean that the police department and the armed forces were competing for the same ammo, Hardina said.

Assault rifles are useful in "active shooter" situations in which there may not be time to wait for a SWAT team to arrive on campus, officials said.

They added that the plan has been in the works for a couple of years and is not related to recent shootings on college campuses, including last year's massacre of 32 students at Virginia Tech by a student with a history of mental illness.

Pistols that campus officers currently use aren't ideal for long shots, said Sgt. Eugene Mejia, UA Police Department spokesman.

"Beyond 50 feet, you lose a lot of accuracy," Mejia said. "You can take a longer, more accurate shot (with the rifles)."

ASU officers will store the new guns in their patrol cars while on duty, taking them out only when a situation warrants their use, Hardina said.

Jan Kelly, an ASU faculty member, said she understands why officers have a need for weapons with increased capabilities. She said she feels comfortable with campus officers' access to the rifles.

"I don't think the police are going to target students," Kelly said. "If they (the guns) aren't visible, most won't really know about them.

"Hopefully we'll never know about them."

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