SPOKANE — A recent Gonzaga University graduate found with more than 1,000 textbooks thought to have been taken from school libraries may have been illegally selling them online, authorities say.
Han Tun Oo, 23, was arrested on a burglary charge Nov. 12 after authorities say he trespassed in Gonzaga libraries. The school banished Oo from both the Foley Center Library and the Chastek Law Library after he was discovered multiple times in October attempting to leave school grounds with several textbooks he hadn’t checked out tucked away in a backpack. Oo had been seen stacking books in the library, scanning them with an iPad and scribbling down titles and prices onto a sheet of paper before he was arrested, according to witnesses.
A subsequent search of Oo’s nearby apartment revealed a total of 1,200 textbooks, according to court documents. Oo told police he’d stolen just 10 textbooks that he sold over the Internet. Those stacked in his apartment had white numbered tabs emerging from the pages, officers wrote, similar to the numbering system used in the law library. Also discovered were packaging materials and addressed envelopes. Authorities later confirmed the books belonged to both the Foley and law libraries.
Library staff have been contacted by third parties saying they’d bought books belonging to Gonzaga and records of those transactions contained details linking to Oo. The titles listed as missing from both libraries are valued in the thousands of dollars.
