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Students across Harvard’s campus complained they were left in the dark after the Harvard University Police Department provided late, limited information regarding reports of gunshots in Harvard Square on Sunday afternoon.
MBTA Transit Police and Cambridge police responded to gunfire at the Harvard Square train station at approximately 2:15 p.m on Sunday. But in the half-hour before Harvard issued an official alert about the incident, students were left with no official information on the active investigation into the shots.
It was not until 2:47 p.m. — more than 30 minutes after the initial police response — that a first alert was sent to Harvard affiliates, asking them to shelter in place as officers searched for a suspect. A second alert, sent at 3:09 p.m., informed affiliates that a search was ongoing and advised students to continue sheltering in place.
In the time between the incident and Harvard’s alerts, student-run tours from the Harvard Student Agency continued to run in Harvard Square. Without any official information, students learned about the gunshots through texts from peers and the anonymous social media app Sidechat, where some circulated photos from Harvard Square and the interior of a halted train.
“I found out from my friend texting me, and then I checked on Sidechat, and that appeared before the HUPD stuff came out, and I think that the promptness is really important,” Sharon Cheng ’28 said.
“URGENT: Just on the train at Harvard square, heard three shots, and there was a shooter who ran out of the train station! PLEASE be careful. He’s on the run,” one student posted at approximately 2:30 p.m.
School of Engineering and Applied Sciences graduate student Theodore “Ted” McCulloch said the delay between the reported gunshots and HUPD’s alert was “not super helpful”and “pretty bad.”
Steven G. Catalano, a HUPD spokesperson, did not respond to repeated requests for comment on this story. University spokespeople also did not respond.
Kaesyn E. Price ’28, who woke up around when the first alert went out, said the time it took for students to be alerted “definitely is worrying.”
“Obviously, you want it to go out the second that it happened,” Price said. “In that 30-minute timespan, many things could have gone wrong.”
It was not until 3:19 p.m., when a third University-wide alert was sent out, that the shelter-in-place order was lifted.
“The search has concluded. The shelter in place has been lifted,” the alert read.
No further details were included.
The ambiguity of the alert left students wondering whether a suspect had been caught. Witnesses had reported seeing a man running from the train station, carrying a handgun, after the incident.
Cambridge police superintendent Frederick Cabral confirmed that there were “no suspects in custody” at 4:15 p.m., nearly an hour after the shelter-in-place order had been lifted.
MBTA Transit Police Superintendent Richard Sullivan confirmed that the shooting appeared to be directed at a “targeted individual,” and that there were no known victims in an emailed statement Sunday afternoon.
Absent further information from HUPD, students turned to social media platforms such as Sidechat for answers to express their frustration with HUPD.
“It’s embarrassing and frankly not okay that it took 27 minutes for the Harvard alert to go out. That could be the difference in saving a life or not,” one student posted.
“26 mins later we get the notification! Great work Harvard emergency msg,” another wrote, in an apparent message to the University-wide alerts.
Harvard had not issued further information about the incident beyond the third alert as of Sunday evening.
—Staff writer Matan H. Josephy can be reached at matan.josephy@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @matanjosephy.
—Staff writer Laurel M. Shugart can be reached at laurel.shugart@thecrimson.com. Follow them on X @laurelmshugart.
