Yale University says it is reviewing an incident in which a black student was questioned by campus police officers after a white student reported her for sleeping in her dormitory common room.
“As we do with every incident, we will be reviewing the call and the response of the police officers to ensure that the proper protocol was followed and to determine if there was anything we could have done better,” Yale spokesman Tom Conroy said in a statement on Wednesday, according to BuzzFeed News.
The development comes days after The Yale Daily News reported that graduate student Lolade Siyonbola said a white student told her to leave the common room, saying she was not supposed to be in the area.
{mosads}”You’re not supposed to be sleeping here. I’m going to call the police,” the white student said, according to Siyonbola.
“I have every right to call the police. You cannot sleep in that room,” the student continued.
Two white police officers arrived soon after and began questioning Siyonbola, as seen in a video she posted.
“You’re in a Yale building and we need to make sure that you belong here,” an officer tells Siyonbola in another video.
“I deserve to be here. I paid tuition like everybody else. I’m not going to justify my existence here,” she told officers. “I am not going to be harassed.”
An officer in the video said the investigation into her status as a student was “protocol.”
A university spokesperson said it took a long time to verify Siyonbola’s student identification card because her preferred name on the card did not match the school’s records.
The spokesman said the university officers are trained “on unconscious bias, de-escalation techniques, and problem-solving, and seek to treat each individual with respect,” according to BuzzFeed.