Inside the Univ. of Virginia gun incident that drew DOJ's ire

In a letter released after President Jim Ryan resigned, the Justice Department questioned U.Va.'s handling of an alleged hate crime against a Jewish student.

By Tyler Kingkade | NBC News | July 10, 2025

University of Virginia President James Ryan resigned last month amid a Justice Department investigation into allegations the school failed to wipe out its diversity programs. But a letter the agency sent U.Va., released last week as part of a public records request, reveals another reason the Justice Department targeted the university.

In it, the department zeroed in on allegations that a fourth-year Jewish student had endured antisemitic bullying and that U.Va. had mishandled the case.

“The facts surrounding this specific controversy and of the UVa’s alleged deliberate indifference and retaliatory treatment of the victim in response are, in a word, disturbing,” Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon wrote May 2.

What the letter doesn’t say was just what happened among the students involved — or that it led to a young man’s arrest on gun and hate crime charges.

The details of the incident, covered by local news outlets at the time, have largely gone unnoticed since Ryan announced his resignation on June 27. But additional records obtained by NBC News show how the dispute at an off-campus house escalated into a criminal case that attracted federal attention. They also shed light on how Jewish advocacy groups have pushed the Justice Department to get involved in campus conflicts — and how successful they’ve been in making that happen.

The University of Virginia didn’t respond to questions about the incident or the Justice Department’s response, citing ongoing criminal proceedings and federal privacy laws. “The University opposes antisemitism and all forms of bigotry, and we take swift action to support students who experience threats or harassment and to hold offenders accountable,” the school said in a statement.

The Justice Department declined to comment.

The Jewish student, whose family asked NBC News not to name him as the alleged victim of a hate crime, lived in a decommissioned fraternity house on Charlottesville’s Rugby Road with 17 other students.

According to court documents, the housemates had been arguing over parties the Jewish student hosted. One of the roommates, Robert Romer, is alleged to have posted antisemitic memes in a group chat for the residents over several days in mid-October, including a photo of Hasidic Jewish men under the heading “Battle of $18.20.” On Oct. 21, Romer texted the house, “I am going to attempt to free Palestine. Anyone is welcome to join in on the beating,” which the Jewish student interpreted as a threat against him, according to court records. Two days later, the student alleged, Romer tried to force his way into his room.

Early Oct. 31, he later testified in court, the Jewish student entered his room and found Romer holding a gun. He said that he touched it to see that it was real and repeatedly asked whether it was loaded but that Romer wouldn’t say. After he alerted other housemates, he said, some began passing the gun around, while others were “freaking out,” before eventually someone hid it.

“I’m very scared at this point,” he said in court. “Especially because someone who had sent messages that I interpreted as antisemitic and I interpreted as pointed towards me, had previously threatened to fight me, didn’t apologize for it, and then was waiting for me in my room holding a gun at midnight — that was something that was incredibly scary.”

He reported the incident to the university and law enforcement the next day, then moved out of the house and arranged to study abroad for the spring semester. “I was afraid to stay at U.Va.,” he testified.

Romer was arrested Nov. 1 and hit with four charges, including brandishing a weapon and hate crime assault, according to his defense attorney, Graven Craig. He was suspended but allowed to return to school in January after he completed a student-run university judicial process, Craig said, while an investigation led by the administration continues.

Craig said that the allegations against Romer “are entirely false” and that the Jewish student “cherry-picked” text messages from a hyperbolic group chat to make them seem worse than they were. The messages, Craig said, were typical of how “college-aged males from diverse backgrounds who all enjoyed poking fun at each other” communicate. He denies that his client pointed a gun at the Jewish student.

Romer’s father, Tom, previously said in a statement that his son was innocent and that a “thorough review of the events will show that there was no hate, no assault and no brandishing.”

Two of the criminal charges against Romer — the gun charge and the charge of entering property to cause damage — were dismissed in May after other housemates testified at a preliminary hearing that the gun had been unloaded and that the Jewish student also briefly held it. Two other charges, including one of hate crime assault, are scheduled to be presented before a grand jury in August, according to court records.

The case could easily have remained local news. But earlier this year, the Jewish student’s father, concerned that university investigations were moving too slowly, contacted two nonprofit organizations that seek to combat antisemitism — the Anti-Defamation League and StandWithUs, a pro-Israel group.

In an April 30 letter they sent along with the Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, they criticize U.Va.’s handling of the complaint and what they call an “improper retaliatory countercomplaint” after a third housemate reported to the school in December that the Jewish student had harassed him over his ethnicity, using racial slurs, which the Jewish student denies. The letter notes that the complaint came “just a short time after” the Jewish student filed his own.

They also allege that the school withheld information about Romer’s student-led disciplinary case from the Jewish student, according to a copy of the letter provided to NBC News.

“The fact that the Jewish student was fortunate to avoid physical harm does not diminish the severity of the threats,” the groups wrote, “rather, it highlights the urgency of serious and substantive University intervention.”

Local conservative blogs and influencers amplified their message, and a conservative alumni organization cited it as part of a campaign to oust Ryan as U.Va.’s president.

When the Justice Department contacted U.Va. about the incident days later, it referred to the letter from the three nonprofit groups, urging the university to follow their demands, including shutting down investigations into the Jewish student. The university did just that on May 12 — ending the five-month investigation and clearing the Jewish student of all allegations, according to a copy of the investigator’s report shared by his father.

“I know that some of the things the Department of Justice is doing right now are controversial,” the student’s father said, “but I was relieved to know that someone with a lot of power and authority over universities was actually getting involved and being the ally that we’ve been looking for outside the Jewish community.”

But the housemate who filed the complaint against the Jewish student, who asked to remain anonymous because he fears harassment, told NBC News that he was “shocked” to learn that the case had reached the attention of the federal government — and that he feels cheated because of it.

“It doesn’t seem like a coincidence at all that the university wrapped this investigation up right after that letter came,” he said. “They deprived me of the due diligence that they owe me.”

StandWithUs said in a statement that it was grateful to have the Justice Department involved but that it remains frustrated that the university still won’t disclose to the Jewish student information about “steps it is taking to ensure his safety.” The group said the department’s involvement should “remind UVA that it doesn’t just have a moral obligation to do so, but a legal one as well.”

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