Edwardsville, Ill. – A college student who was accused of threatening a “murderous rampage” similar to April’s deadly shooting spree at Virginia Tech pleaded not guilty Wednesday.
A gun dealer had alerted federal authorities about Olutosin Oduwole, saying he had seemed overly anxious to get an online shipment of semiautomatic weapons, according to an affidavit filed in court by a police detective.
The Southern Illinois University student was arrested Friday after police said they found a handwritten note in his car demanding payment to a PayPal account, threatening that “if this account doesn’t reach $50,000 in the next 7 days then a murderous rampage similar to the VT shooting will occur at another highly populated university. THIS IS NOT A JOKE!”
Oduwole, who turned 22 on Wednesday, was charged a day earlier with making a terrorist threat. He was being held on $1.1 million bail.
During a brief court appearance, attorney Patricia Dennis entered a not-guilty plea on his behalf. She declined to comment.
Friends and a former attorney for Oduwole called the arrest a misunderstanding that might be related to the sometimes violent lyrics of his rap songs. Regina Hays, the university’s police chief, said the threatening note had rap lyrics scrawled on the other side of the paper.
