Student leading diversity push at KU arrested on campus on drug charges

Kansas University Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little listens to a question as she moderates a town hall forum on race at Woodruff Auditorium in the Kansas Union in November 2015.

A Kansas University student who has been a vocal leader of a group pushing for diversity improvements at KU was arrested Friday on campus.

Kennedi Grant, 20, was arrested on charges of possession of marijuana, a controlled substance and drug paraphernalia, according to Douglas County Sheriff’s Office and KU Office of Public Safety records. KU police arrested Grant shortly before 3 p.m. Friday at Jayhawker Towers apartments, tower B, 1603 W. 15th St., according to police records.

Kennedi Grant, 20

Police responded to Jayhawker Towers after a call from a reporting party, and only one person was arrested in the incident, KU police Capt. James Anguiano said. He said KU police forwarded the case to the district attorney’s office for review.

In November, Grant, who was president of KU’s Black Student Union, led a group of mostly black students calling themselves Rock Chalk Invisible Hawk onto the stage at KU’s town hall forum on race, interrupting Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little and other students to speak and read a list of diversity- and inclusion-related demands for KU.

Grant, who identified herself as Kynnedi Grant to the Journal-World, said from the stage that she and some friends were verbally and physically assaulted at an off-campus house party on Halloween, called racial slurs and had a gun pulled on them.

She accused Lawrence police of failing to investigate the incident because she and her friends are black.

A police report was filed, however. The case remains under investigation by Lawrence police, according to Lawrence police Sgt. Trent McKinley.

Grant and other members of Rock Chalk Invisible Hawk have been active on social media, led a December protest in the chancellor’s office and have spoken to multiple media outlets about their push for diversity improvement at KU.

Grant was released from the Douglas County Jail after posting $5,000 bond. She is scheduled to appear in court Feb. 17; if formal charges are filed, they would officially be filed at that time.

She does not have any prior criminal records in Douglas County District Court.

— Reporter Conrad Swanson contributed to this report.