University of Missouri Fires Campus Cop Over Blackface Photo

University of Missouri officials say they have fired a campus police officer after verifying he was in a photo depicting him blackface.

The university said Tuesday in a news release that Marcus Collins acknowledged he was the person in the picture and that it was taken before he was hired with the police department in January 2018.

A message left for Collins was not immediately returned.

Chancellor Alexander Cartwright says that this type of behavior is not tolerated at the university, adding they understand how this impacts the entire community profoundly.

Spokesman Christian Basi says Collins is the only person depicted in the photo, but that he did not know when or where the photo was taken or any other context. He says university officials received the photo on Tuesday.