What kind of paranoid world are we living in?

A University of California, Davis, police declaration supporting the arrest of James Marchbanks [a graduate student drama instructor in the theater and dance department] describes the fear three students reportedly felt when he presented an envelope holding end-of-course evaluations by saying, “I have a bomb.”

“There was no expression of a smile or indicating he was joking,” a student told campus police, according to the declaration. “My stomach dropped and I felt my life flash before my eyes.”

But a letter reportedly signed by 13 other students in the class says Marchbanks was clearly using a figure of speech to present the documents that might “bomb” his career.

He spent four days in jail before they concluded there was not enough information to determine whether he should be charged with a crime. You can bet he won’t be joking like that again.