JD founder's case storms social media

What the police said

Minneapolis Police Department spokesman John Elder said an investigation was ongoing and declined to provide details of the arrest, according to a Reuters report.

"We are very much in the infancy of this investigation," Elder said. Authorities may decide not to charge Liu at all, he added. "There are no travel restrictions on him at the moment and he's not charged with a crime at this time," a Bloomberg report read.

The $0 bail doesn't indicate Liu is innocent, Elder said to China Business News, and it doesn't mean he is guilty either, the spokesman added.

Elder said the police arrested Liu based on probable cause, which means police had found reasonable evidence indicating Liu had committed a certain crime after receiving a relevant report, and decided to arrest and investigate the person.

Police released Liu after 16 hours, believing there was no need to keep Liu in custody.

The University's response

The University of Minnesota said Liu was a student in its doctor of business administration program, primarily held in Beijing in partnership with Tsinghua University and aimed at full-time executives. The students were in the Twin Cities last week as part of their training, Reuters reported.

University spokeswoman Emma Bauer declined to comment further and referred questions to the Minneapolis Police Department in a statement, the report said.