They call it “Trump Derangement Syndrome,” and this one particular professor has certainly got it.
Sociology professor Mark J. Bird brought a gun to the College of Southern Nevada, where he is an emeritus professor, and shot himself while in the bathroom. He later said it was to protest Donald Trump’s presidency, which was noted in the police report.
The odd event took place on the second day of classes. Police found the professor bleeding outside a campus bathroom due to a self-inflicted shot to his arm. Bird had left a hundred dollar bill taped to the bathroom mirror, supposedly for the janitor, because of the bloody mess he left behind. Police found a .22-caliber handgun and a spent shell casing inside the bathroom as well.
Bird, 69, was not scheduled to teach classes in 2018.
He was charged with “discharging a gun within a prohibited structure, carrying a concealed weapon without a permit and possessing a dangerous weapon on school property,” according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
The Las Vegas professor is scheduled to appear in court for a hearing on Sept. 17 for felony gun charges.
The school has stayed relatively quiet about the incident, only sending out an “all safe” alert the day of the event and later vaguely mentioning the incident in a monthly newsletter.
“They never really told the students much about it except that it was resolved on the actual day of the shooting,” Robert Manis, president of the college’s faculty union, the Nevada Faculty Alliance, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. “When you don’t give the full details, then rumors go crazy. It’s unfortunate because it made the students and faculty very afraid and allowed rumors to proliferate.”
