Greensboro police report that a man has been arrested on the campus of North Carolina A&T State University with weapons and hundreds of rounds of ammunition.
According to court documents, 27-year-old Brandon James Bentley was charged on Sunday, March 26 with the following:
- Felony having a gun on educational property
- Felony having an explosive device on educational property
- Reckless driving
- Possessing a weapon on the educational property (not a gun)
- Driving with a revoked license
- Carrying a concealed gun
Bentley was reportedly found on the HBCU campus at Sullivan Street and N. Benbow Road with a revolver, a loaded handgun, a rifle, two shotguns, and several hundred rounds of ammunition. He was also found to have a “makeshift firework explosive,” brass knuckles, a machete, a sword, a “blowdart weapon,” a crossbow, a hatchet, a stun gun, a dozen knives, “claws,” and a baton.
Also among the items taken from Bentley were bolts for the crossbow, two “choking devices,” a window breaker, a chicken foot, pepper spray, and “holy water.”
Although the arrest happened more than a week ago, NC A&T students and parents just finding out about it now.
Shelby Samuels, a junior at the university told WFMY that she was upset that the student body wasn’t notified.
“Nothing was talked about no alerts were sent we have an alert system for these reasons,” Samuels said. “We’re an HBCU campus hate crimes are a thing so to think he was so close to his goal of coming on this campus and doing what he wanted to do and us not know a thing about it” Samuels continued.
Another NC A&T student, Jannisha Stevens shared Samuels’ sentiment that there should have been more transparency between the university administration and the students.
“I don’t think that it was handled well,” she said. “To hear about torture mechanism tools is really scary and I don’t know why he would have that. Who is it for? Is it for somebody on this campus?” she said. “I should know what’s going on campus. Especially something like this, for it to be kept from us…what is it? Is it an agenda or anything like that? Because I want to be able to protect myself if I see somebody like that or someone suspicious, so I can report it instead of being completely clueless.”
The university said Bentley is not associated with A&T in any way and decided against issuing a campus alert because the suspect was immediately arrested and there was no ongoing threat to campus safety.
Court documents said Bentley was afraid and had the weapons as protection from a cult he felt was after him.
His bond was set at $100,000 and he was able to post bond on Monday, March 27. A condition of his release was that he could not go on any educational property whatsoever.
The investigation is ongoing.
