Updated: Monday 5:19 p.m. Three Syracuse University students were stabbed at 1 a.m. Sunday as a group of men tried to enter the Alpha Tau Omega house on Walnut Place, said Sgt. Tom Connellan of the Syracuse Police Department.

The students were taken to University Hospital at 1:45 a.m. Ryan Saroya, 22, and John Tate, 19, were discharged Sunday. Nick Condit, 20, was discharged Monday, said nursing staff at University Hospital.

Rashaun Cameron, 20, of Syracuse, was arraigned Sunday morning on two counts of assault in the second degree and two counts of criminal possession of a weapon in the fourth degree, according to Onondaga County Justice Center records. He is being held at the Justice Center on $20,000 bail, according to the records.

Police are investigating if there was a second stabber or if Cameron stabbed all three, Connellan said. Police are searching for the three members of the group who got away, but received few details on their appearance, Connellan said. Cameron has not cooperated with police, Connellan said.

Cameron and three other men tried to enter the ATO house Sunday morning through the front door, Connellan said. Condit, an ATO brother, was on the front porch smoking a cigarette and told the group they couldn’t enter at the front. ATO had security at the side door, but not at the front, Condit said.

Someone from Cameron’s group shouted, ‘We’re the Alpha Beta Bloods!’ Tate told police.

The group moved forward and began to attack Condit, Connellan said. At first, they punched him in the nose, knocking him to the ground. When he tried to get back up, he immediately got hit again, Condit said.

Cameron then stabbed Condit four times, Connellan said. Condit suffered wounds to the armpit, lower back and right arm, and his lung was punctured in the attack, Connellan said.

‘I don’t remember feeling it at all. I was just out of it because I had just got punched and kicked,’ Condit said. ‘And it was just adrenaline, I just wanted to do something back. But they had a knife, you know, I couldn’t really do anything.’

Tate came to help Condit and tried to take the knife away from Cameron. Cameron stabbed Tate in the right shoulder, Connellan said.

Saroya, another ATO brother, arrived on the porch and was kicked in the face. Saroya was stabbed in the waist and the left buttocks during the fight, Connellan said.

As Cameron’s group ran away, ATO brothers signaled an SU Department of Public Safety officer driving by in a marked car, DPS Chief Callisto said. The officer chased Cameron down and arrested him at Harrison Street, Callisto said. Syracuse Police later recovered a knife near the 300 block of Marshall Street, Callitso said.

Condit waited by a parked car for the ambulance to arrive, he said.

‘I was a scared for a little while because I was losing a lot of blood,’ Condit said. ‘I was like, ‘This is not good, I don’t know what happened to me.’ I had a nice little button-down, and it was just soaked with blood.’

The hardest part of the night came later, Condit said, when he had to call his parents. He called home at 3:30 a.m. and no one picked up. So he called again.

‘The third time my little sister picked up and that was hard because she’s 12. I was like, ‘Cassie, you’ve got to find Mom and Dad, it’s very important.’ I didn’t want to tell her,’ Condit said. ‘My mom was just crying, upset. My dad was just pissed off. He just wanted to take it out on somebody.’

‘I see it really as a freak thing. It could have happened to anybody.’ Condit said he plans to press charges against Cameron.

‘Obviously folks need to be cognizant of events they’re going to hold,’ said DPS Chief Tony Callisto. ‘They need to report anybody suspicious immediately. And folks need to be using their best judgment.’

DPS did not issue an Orange Alert after the stabbing because they did not feel there was an immediate threat Sunday, Callisto said.

‘In this case, within literally minutes of the incident, the person was arrested and the weapon was recovered,’ he said. ‘Had we not found him or known that he threw the knife we may have considered putting out an alert.’

Eddie Banks-Crosson, director of fraternity and sorority affairs who was at the scene Sunday morning, said he plans to evaluate the situation before acting.

‘I plan to make sure that my students are serviced properly and that we are meeting their needs at this point,’ Banks-Crosson said.

Check back at dailyorange.com for more updates.

–Asst. News Editor Julia Terruso contributed reporting to this article.

adbrow03@syr.edu

Published on September 20, 2009 at 12:00 pm