Campus police used pepper spray to break up a graduation party at an apartment complex at the University of Maryland early Saturday morning, according to a statement from the university police department.
Two arrests were made. According to the police account, officers responding to complaints of a "loud party and a possible fight" arrived at an apartment building in the 8500 block of Boteler Lane around 1:46 a.m. They were told that a fight was going on inside and that someone "may have had a baseball bat," police said, and a decision was made to shut the party down.
Reinforcements were called in, and pepper spray was used twice, once when an officer was surrounded in a hallway and a second time during a "confrontation" in the parking lot.
Numerous comments on Twitter have decried the use of force and questioned whether the incident was racially motivated.
Police officials said they are examining footage from body cameras worn by the officers, as well as from cameras in the vicinity of the apartment building.
University President Wallace D. Loh tweeted that he met with university police chief David Mitchell and asked for a "thorough investigation."