Post last updated at 11:46 a.m. Wednesday, July 26:
A KU offensive lineman has been charged following an alleged bomb threat made to football facilities on Monday.
Joseph (Joe) Krause, 21, was formally charged with aggravated criminal threat Tuesday in Douglas County District Court. The charge is a level-5, or midlevel-severity, felony.
Krause told the judge he planned to hire his own attorney. He was arrested Monday afternoon and held without bond, and he appeared via videoconference from the Douglas County jail.
Prosecutors did not discuss details of the allegations against Krause during the brief court hearing, but they requested a $30,000 cash or surety bond.
Judge Stacey Donovan set Krause’s bond at $10,000 cash or surety, meaning he would need to pay a bondsman $1,000 to be released from the Douglas County jail. He bonded out Tuesday evening, jail records show.
Prosecutors requested that Krause have no contact with non-law enforcement witnesses in the case as part of his bond conditions, but the judge did not agree to that condition. The charging document lists some executives with NIL companies as witnesses.
Anderson Family Football Complex and some other KU football facilities were evacuated Monday after someone allegedly called in a bomb threat. Sources close to the incident said that Krause didn’t make the call with any serious claims or malicious intent.
Krause, a redshirt sophomore, has been an offensive lineman for the University of Kansas since 2020 and has played in two games. He’s from Prairie Village and graduated from Shawnee Mission East High School, according to his football roster page. Two of his teammates were present in court for the hearing.
Krause’s next court date is a status conference set for Aug. 2.
All arrestees and defendants in criminal cases should be presumed not guilty unless and until they are convicted.
A spokesperson for KU football on Tuesday sent a statement from Kansas Athletics regarding the incident.
“We are aware of a situation involving one of our student-athletes,” the statement read. “We take the safety of our staff, student-athletes and coaches very seriously. We are gathering more information and will have no further comment at this time.”
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Note: This post has been updated regarding the no-contact order based on corrected information from the DA’s office.
Jack Ritter (he/him), a contributor to The Lawrence Times, is a student at the University of Kansas studying journalism. He is also a graduate of Lawrence High School, where he was the editor-in-chief of The Budget Online.
Read more of his work for the Times here. You can view more of his work for The Budget Online here.
— Reporter Mackenzie Clark contributed to this article.
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Pancho Metz / Contributed photo
