Residents of a high-rise student housing facility have been throwing beer and liquor bottles off their balconies for more than a year, raining glass and other objects down on the nearby Islamic Center of Tucson’s roof and parking lot.

But the vandalism and abuse reached a fever pitch during the University of Arizona’s homecoming celebration this past weekend, said Kamel Didan, vice chairman of the board of the mosque and community center, which has been in Tucson since 1962.

“This weekend was absolutely terrible. Someone could have died,” said Didan, who is also an associate professor at the UA. “Imagine kids on the 14th floor, tossing whiskey bottles on people. When I came in Sunday morning, I was shocked at our parking lot. It looked like somebody smashed glass all over the place.”

He also heard that racial comments and obscenities were shouted from balconies at a woman entering the center. The racial comments were a first, he said, and he doesn’t consider the repeated vandalism a hate crime.

“This is mostly kids being very disrespectful, kids being drunk and not realizing how dangerous they are being,” he said.