EAST LANSING, Mich. (WXYZ) — For years, Marco Diaz-Munoz specifically requested to teach in room 114 in Berkey Hall. The humanities professor says it had the best view of the Eli Broad Museum next door and Grand River Ave, one of the most bustling places in East Lansing. He never imagined that very classroom would be the first target in a shooting rampage that would change campus as he knew it.
On February 13th, 2023, Diaz-Munoz was teaching a course on Cuba circa 1500s. Around 8:15 p.m. the professor says he began hearing an unfamiliar sound.
"We heard, or I heard what I thought was an explosion. And like 3, 4 seconds after that another one and another 4 seconds after that, another one," said Professor Marco Diaz-Munoz.
What sounded like an explosion was actually a gunman standing in the doorway at the back of Diaz-Munoz's rectangular classroom. The shooter took aim at the students before continuing his rampage at the student union. The bullets would claim the lives of Arielle Anderson, Alex Verner, and later Brian Fraser at the student union. There were also 5 others injured.
"I was lecturing when this happened so the screen, blackboard behind me and I am just witnessing this and in disbelief and telling myself this cannot be happening. This is not happening. This is a joke," said the professor as he recalled the tragedy unfolding." I moved very quickly from disbelief to terror to acceptance, not of what was happening but I said this is your hour. You’re going to feel bullets. This is happening in my mind flashing very fast. And I just said prepare. This is it."
Diaz-Munoz says for the next few days he found himself taking sleeping medication to cope with what had just become his reality. But just 7 days after the shooting, the professor made a choice to return to his students, despite the University offering him the option to take the remainder of the semester off.
"I felt on one level it was cruel to let my students, some of them needed to graduate, go back to that classroom without me, with a stranger who had not felt or experienced what they felt without me," said Diaz-Munoz.
Shortly after the shooting, Diaz-Munoz sat down with multiple news agencies for interviews including 7 Action News. Despite the psychological challenges that come with witnessing an act of violence like this, the professor says it was important to him to use his voice and describe what he witnessed as he called out lawmakers.
"No one who has any humanity left in you or could possibly have seen what I saw and not feel like something needs to be done because being frozen as a politician or being frozen as a lawmaker, as a powerful person was not an option," said Diaz-Munoz.
Since the shooting, the state has passed sweeping gun reform including safe storage laws, universal background checks and red flag laws.
However, the scars left behind at Michigan State University are still in the process of healing.
"The innocence, and I’m using this word just for the sake of explanation, of going to campus never crossing your mind that this could happen on campus, is no longer there," said Diaz-Munoz.
Professor Diaz Munoz says as the community looks forward, we all have a responsibility to contribute and check on each other so there is less darkness among us.
"I think all of us are born good. All of us had a light that shines in the darkness. All of us. But at some point, somebody who faces too many things, their lights go out," he said. "The person that walked into my classroom had no light left inside. Had no guide. No humanity. No emotions left. But I wouldn’t say he was a monster on his own. He was symptomatic."
