Former Student Sets Everything On Fire To Protest Against U.S. Military Intervention In Iraq And Afghanistan

According to charges filed Friday, A 19-year-old former student at St. Catherine University allegedly set off several different fires across campus on Wednesday. The fires were apparently set in retaliation for U.S. military intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Tnuza J. Hassan, of Minneapolis, allegedly told police that “she wanted the school to burn to the ground and that her intent was to hurt people,” according to the complaint which charges her with one count of felony first-degree arson filed in Ramsey County District Court.

According to the charge, Hassan said similar attacks happened on “Muslim land” and no one cared if Muslims were hurt. She told police and fire investigators, “You guys are lucky that I don’t know how to build a bomb because I would have done that.”

The fires began around 11:40am when the first was reported, the last was reported around 2:00pm, thank God nobody was hurt. Ramsey County jail records show that she was arrested at the school’s Jeanne d’Arc Auditorium at 2004 Randolph Av.

Hassan made her first court appearance Friday afternoon, where her bail was set to $100,000. She was ordered to surrender her passport, and she is not allowed to set foot on campus.

Court documents gave this account of the events and Hassan’s motives:

“She said she had been a student at Saint Catherine’s but quit last fall because she and her family were planning to vacation in Ethiopia,” the complaint said. “Hassan said she started the fires because she’s been reading about the U.S. military destroying schools in Iraq and Afghanistan and she felt that she should do exactly the same thing.

“She said that her fire-starting was not as successful as she had wanted. She said the most successful fire she set was at Saint Mary’s [residence hall] where she set a couch on fire.”