Mizzou Fires Professor|for Threatening Reporter

COLUMBIA, Mo. (CN) - The University of Missouri has fired Melissa Click, the professor caught on video last fall requesting "muscle" to remove a student journalist from attempting to cover a protest in a public quadrangle.

The incident happened in November, as students gathered to celebrate the ouster of several university officials over a perceived lack of attention to alleged racial incidents on campus. The video quickly went viral and a second video surfaced this month showing Click cursing at police officers during a protest at the University's Homecoming Parade.

Click's actions prompted 100 Republican lawmakers in the Missouri Legislature to send a letter calling on the school to fire Click.

The board voted 4-2 in favor of termination on Thursday during a closed session in Kansas City, with Pamela Quigg Henrickson and John R. Phillips voting no, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.

Interim Chancellor Hank Foley told reporters during a conference call Thursday afternoon that the decision to fire Click "was in the best interest of the university."

Click has the right to appeal.

The University of Missouri retained the law firm of Bryan Cave to conduct an investigation of Click's conduct following a decision to suspend Click on Jan. 27. Bryan Cave submitted a 29-page report to the board.

In a 5-page written response to the investigative report, Click claims the report omits a number of crucial details and events that would give context to her actions.

"While some would judge me by a short portion of videotape, I do not think that this is a fair way to evaluate these events," she said. "Those videotaped moments (for which I have formally and publicly apologized) deserve to be understood in a wider frame of reference, among all of the momentous events of the fall semester."

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