Police activity outside of Harbin Hall on the Georgetown University campusWhen students at Harbin Hall were rousted from their beds by Georgetown University officials at 6 a.m. Saturday, some thought it might be a cruelly timed fire drill.
It was something odder still: Campus police had discovered a cache of chemicals for making methamphetamines inside a room on the top floor of the freshman residence hall.
Police arrested three male students Saturday morning, hours after evacuating 400 students from the nine-floor hall.
Students struggled to reconcile the discovery of a suspected meth lab with their image of Georgetown, a prim national university with a scholarly and somewhat preppie culture.
"I would understand if someone got caught doing it. Making it, that's different. It's shocking," said Gina Park, 19, a sophomore from Hong Kong.
A Harbin resident called campus police about 5 a.m. to report a strange odor coming from a room on the ninth floor. Officers went to the room and found "chemicals consistent with a meth lab, but no actual drugs," said Officer Istmania Bonilla, a Metropolitan Police spokeswoman.
By 6 a.m., "people were going around pounding on doors, saying, 'You need to evacuate,'" said Natalie Muller, 18, a Harbin resident. Hundreds of freshmen poured out in the chilly morning air in pajamas and were sent to the dining hall and student center. Students were briefly allowed back inside the building three hours later, then ordered to leave again.
"We didn't find out until 2 1/2 or 3 hours later what was going on," said Katya Funk, 18, a bleary-eyed freshman in a sweatsuit. "It's been so much fun."
No student was harmed, said Julie Green Bataille, university spokeswoman. Three unidentified male students were held for questioning as displaced Harbin Hall residents milled around among rescue vehicles and drug-sniffing dogs. Gawkers included the university's Bulldog mascot.
Georgetown students, as with many colleges, are known for occasional binge drinking and casual drug use. Hard drugs are less common, students said, and a meth lab in a freshman dorm room was heretofore unknown.
"For this campus, this is very out of the norm," said Kayla Bostwick, 18, a Harbin resident. "This should not happen.
Source: Washington Post
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