On Wednesday, a WKU student’s car was vandalized in Parking Structure 2 with a racial slur.

Cheyenne Mitchell, a senior from Lexington, returned to her car after class to find the racial slur carved into it. Mitchell said there had been an brief altercation earlier between a friend of hers and the man who allegedly vandalized her car.

Prior to the vandalism, Mitchell said her friend was standing in an empty parking space in PS2. He was holding the spot for Mitchell to park her car.

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“The guy was mad because the person that was holding the space for me wouldn’t let him pull in it,” Mitchell said. “[The guy] was trying to force my friend out of the way with his car, and my friend wasn’t going to move.”

Mitchell said the man who she could not identify proceeded to call the Bowling Green Police Department before backing away from the spot and driving away. Mitchell added she was then able to pull into the parking space. As they were exiting PS2, Mitchell said her friend briefly spoke to the man before heading to class.

It was not until Mitchell returned to her car after class that she saw the vandalism.

“It upset me some and scared me a little bit because I didn’t know what to do,” Mitchell said. “I was in shock about it that somebody would do that to my car in broad daylight.”

Mitchell reported the vandalism to the WKU Police Department who have since opened an investigation.

“They called the Bowling Green police also, and they’re trying to connect with each other to find out who it was that did this,” Mitchell said.

Rafael Casas, a sergeant major with the WKUPD, said there is currently an open investigation.

“We’ve been working all the leads and everything that we have, so as of right now it’s just an ongoing investigation, and we’re trying to exhaust our leads,” Casas said.

In a statement, President Gary Ransdell said the university will do everything necessary to investigate the crime.

“This is not reflective of our values and our commitment to diversity on the WKU campus,” Ransdell said in a statement released on Facebook. “We expect our students, faculty and staff to treat one another with respect and civility and to work together to create a safe, welcoming campus environment that fully embraces diversity.”

Mitchell said until now she had believed race relations were somewhat amicable on campus. She said she has never experienced a race-related crime on campus before.

“I just know that from now on I need to be aware of my surroundings,” Mitchell said.

Reporter Emma Collins can be reached at 270-745-6011 and [email protected].