From having coffee to decapitation

**Unamused Cat** · January 22nd, 2009, 03:41 PM

Haiyang Zhu

BLACKSBURG, Va. (AP) -- A graduate student from China was decapitated with a kitchen knife in a campus cafe at Virginia Tech by another graduate student who knew her, police said Thursday.

Xin Yang, 22, was killed Wednesday night after arriving at the campus from Beijing on Jan. 8 to begin studying accounting, Virginia Tech Police Chief Wendell Flinchum said.

Her accused attacker, 25-year-old Haiyang Zhu of Ningbo, China, knew the victim but no motive for the slaying has been determined, Flinchum said. School records showed that Haiyang was listed as one of Xin's emergency contacts.

Haiyang was charged with first-degree murder and was being held without bond at the Montgomery County Jail. His attorney, Stephanie Cox, did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

Haiyang and Xin had been having coffee in a cafe in the Graduate Life Center, where Xin was living. About seven other people who were in the coffee shop told police that the two hadn't been arguing before the attack.

Police received two 911 calls shortly after 7 p.m. Wednesday, Flinchum said, and were on the scene in a little more than a minute to take Haiyang into custody.

Flinchum said Haiyang was not known to the campus police or to the university team that deals with mentally disturbed students.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories...MPLATE=DEFAULT

**Peeperann** · January 22nd, 2009, 03:51 PM

Holy shit! As much as i'm glad my kids all went or are going to college, i'm glad all but one live in their homes and are married so they don't meet freaks like these.

My youngest son has his own apartment, and already has a boyfriend, so no dates there.

Poor girl, my heart goes out to her family and friends. And poor VA tech, another horror on campus..............

**Abroad** · January 22nd, 2009, 03:51 PM

That poor, poor young woman......

**Tazzzz** · January 22nd, 2009, 04:00 PM

Geez , stabbing someone once or twice might be an argument got out of hand. But chopping there fucking head off goes into a whole nother place. Especially with a kitchen knife, now were into the land of the seriously demented shit.

**sanityslipping** · January 22nd, 2009, 04:10 PM

seven witnesses!!! cops were called, took two minutes to respond, and the girl had already lost her head. How horrific!! Can't believe it.

**theskyisfalling** · January 22nd, 2009, 04:29 PM

What is going on with those kids up at Virginia Tech? First, the shooting in 2007 and now this. My kid will so not be going to college there!

**Tazzzz** · January 22nd, 2009, 04:40 PM

22-year-old Xin Yang from Beijing, China.

Geez, not to sound like an ass or inconsiderate, but 7 freekin people were in the café when it happened, grow some balls and throw a damn chair or something. Cops were Johnny on the spot though, 1 minute response time is pretty damn quick, but it takes longer than a minute to decapitate someone.

They scared the shit out of 40,000 people with there emergency notice. Wonder how many people had flashbacks about the other killings.

Within 40 minutes of the murder, Virginia Tech sent out 40,000 messages alerting the campus of what happened.

Virginia Tech spokesman Larry Hincker said, "We notified the campus community that there was a murder and a suspect was in custody. About 40 minutes later we sent out another message basically releasing people because the first message told them to stay put."

**Sister Iroz** · January 22nd, 2009, 04:52 PM

(CNN) -- A female graduate student at Virginia Tech was killed Wednesday night when a man she knew attacked her with a knife and decapitated her, a school spokesman said.

Virginia Tech spokesman Mark Owczarski said Thursday that Xin Yang's killing was the first on the campus since April 16, 2007, when a shooter killed 32 people before turning a gun on himself.

Yang, 22, from Beijing, China, was killed at the Au Bon Pain restaurant in the Graduate Life Center at around 7 p.m., school spokesman Larry Hincker said in a written statement.

Campus police took Haiyang Zhu, 25, into custody at the scene. The Ningbo, China, native has been charged with first-degree murder and is being held without bail at a local jail, Hincker said.

Zhu did not say anything to the arresting officers, said campus police Chief Wendell Flinchum.

"There was blood on him," Flinchum said. The young woman and the suspect "were not seen arguing, or anything of that nature," he added, citing witness statements.

Authorities said the two students knew each other. "Based on emergency contact records maintained by the university, it is known that Zhu and Yang knew each other," Hincker said. No other details were provided.

The young woman had only arrived at the university two weeks ago to begin studies in accounting, he said in the statement.

Zhu is a graduate student pursuing a doctorate in agricultural and applied economics. He began studies at Virginia Tech in fall 2008, Hincker said.

"Our hearts go out to the victim and her family," President Charles W. Steger said in a letter to the campus community.

http://www.tampabays10.com/news/nati...98702&catid=81

**sanityslipping** · January 22nd, 2009, 04:54 PM

Geez, not to sound like an ass or inconsiderate, but 7 freekin people were in the café when it happened, grow some balls and throw a damn chair or something.

That's something that crossed my mind. I mean, unless her head came off in one fell swoop, then somebody could have done something!

**Athena** · January 22nd, 2009, 08:56 PM

Originally Posted by sanityslipping

That's something that crossed my mind. I mean, unless her head came off in one fell swoop, then somebody could have done something!

1.) Odds are, she was dead before anyone even registered what was going on.

2.) No reasonable person would step in knowing that, and

3.) Diffusion of Responsibility. It's a documented psychological event which pretty much dictates that, when there are multiple witnesses to a crime, those people are less likely to intervene than if any ONE of them witnessed it by themselves... Because each person thinks the guy next to him is going to step in.

People step in all the time when they think something can be done. In a situation like this, I'd bet a million dollars that the only thing quick enough to stop this guy would have been a bullet. Otherwise, she's already dead by the time you take the steps necessary to reach the situation to do something about it. And, if she's already dead, are you going to risk your life to see to it her head remains otherwise intact?

**theskyisfalling** · January 22nd, 2009, 09:02 PM

I've also read about that Athena. We called it the 'Bystander Effect' in my sociology class. Everyone thinks that someone else is going to help out.

**Pete Bondurant** · January 22nd, 2009, 09:05 PM

It is obvious that the male students within this university are the most spineless cowards upon the face of this earth. I knew it when the mass shooting occurred. Not one man on the entire campus attempted to stop the insane Korean man from his murderous spree and now this. I sincerely hope there is no ROTC on this campus. If so, the individuals therein should not be allowed to be commissioned. This school should be turned into an all female college.

**Silvahalo** · January 22nd, 2009, 11:35 PM

Diffusion of Responsibility, also knows as, "bystander-apathy." I remember the case-study in class, on the young lady, Catherine Genovese, of Queens NY, who was brutally murdered. It took 30 minutes for the attack to end. See her attacker came back as he saw no one was trying to stop him, so he came back to finish her off. 38 people heard and one even saw her dragging herself in a desperate attempt to flee, still not one person did a damn thing to help. Eventually a 911 call was placed but she was already dead by this point.

Sick shit...seriously demented fucker.
What a lovely girl too...the parents I'm sure are devastated. Yep, I'd be taking out the Katana sword if this was my child, no doubt.

Xin Yang

**Jaded** · January 23rd, 2009, 02:01 PM

Front-paged....

http://www.dreamindemon.com/2009/01/...-decapitation/

I borrowed the title UC. :)

**swivel** · January 23rd, 2009, 03:08 PM

Originally Posted by theskyisfalling

What is going on with those kids up at Virginia Tech? First, the shooting in 2007 and now this. My kid will so not be going to college there!

Hmmm... you raise an interesting point. I wouldn't mind seeing what the trend is on their applications compared to some other Virginia schools.

**Sister Iroz** · January 23rd, 2009, 03:19 PM

Xin Yang's head was cut off with a kitchen knife, just weeks after arriving in the United States from China to study accounting.

Her alleged attacker, Haiyang Zhu, also from China, was arrested at the scene by an officer who arrived less than a minute after receiving an emergency call.

On January 7, he wrote on a Chinese-language blog he had been so frustrated over stock losses and other problems that he thought "only of killing someone or committing suicide".

Miss Xin, 22, was believed to have been having coffee with Haiyang in the campus Au Bon Pain cafe.

Seven witnesses from the cafe have said there was no argument or shouting prior to the killing on Wednesday at 7pm.

The officer on the scene reported finding 25-year-old Haiyang holding her head in his hand, according to a police affidavit.

http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/Wor...ui_Cho_Shot_32

He is a sick fuck holding her head in his hands. Oh my God I can't even stand the thought.

Police now say the victim was decapitated, and that at least seven others watched as the graduate student was murdered.

Police received a call that a female student was being assaulted in the cafe at the Graduate Life Center at Donaldson-Brown. It ended with what police are now calling a horrific crime scene.

Virginia Tech Police Chief Wendell Flinchum says the first officer arrived within one minute.

"She found the suspect in the café along with the victim. It was a horrific crime scene and the victim had been decapitated," Flinchum said.

http://www.nbc12.com/global/story.asp?s=9720821

**Sister Iroz** · January 23rd, 2009, 03:26 PM

BLACKSBURG, Va. (AP) - A March 5 preliminary court hearing is scheduled for a Virginia Tech graduate student accused of decapitating a fellow Chinese student.

Haiyang Zhu (hy-yuhng-joo) is being held without bond on a charge of first-degree murder in the kitchen-knife slaying of 22-year-old Xin Yang (shin yuhng) in a campus cafe Wednesday night.

Investigators are seeking court approval to search cell phone and computer records, diaries and any other materials that they hope will reveal a motive for the killing on the Blacksburg campus.

A police court affidavit states that Tech police officer Nicole Irvine saw the 25-year-old suspect holding the victim's head in his hands.

http://www.nbc12.com/Global/story.as...&nav=menu128_2

**sQuid** · January 23rd, 2009, 08:48 PM

I honestly don't understand the concept of standing still. I love those dateline or 20/20 experiments where they mess with people to see who will speak up. Like the guy in the park yelling at his wife and hitting her, only like 3 people stopped to see if she was ok? What is wrong with people?

**Sister Iroz** · January 24th, 2009, 01:56 PM

BLACKSBURG -- About 10 days before the beheading of a female graduate student from China that led to a murder charge against Haiyang Zhu, he told a fellow student at Virginia Tech that he was attracted to the woman and hoped to become her boyfriend.

"He said he liked the girl very much and he wants to be her boyfriend, I think," said the friend, who requested anonymity for reasons of personal privacy.

Zhu, 25, is charged with first-degree murder in the Wednesday night slaying of Xin Yang, 22, of Beijing, who had arrived at Tech only two weeks earlier.

Zhu, who was studying agriculture and applied economics, is accused of using a kitchen knife to decapitate Yang, who had enrolled in a graduate program at Tech to study accounting.

The friend said Zhu did not mention whether Yang felt similarly about him or if he had known her before she arrived at Tech this semester.

This was the only time the friend had heard Zhu talk about Yang. The friend said Zhu arrived in the United States last summer to begin graduate studies in the fall semester.

Tech Police Chief Wendell Flinchum does not plan to offer more details about the relationship between Zhu and Yang, said school spokesman Larry Hincker.

The bizarre slaying in the Au Bon Café on the first floor of the Graduate Life Center at Donaldson Brown had acquaintances of Zhu wondering what had gone wrong.

Ryan Rouelle heard yesterday that the alleged assailant was Zhu, who was a teaching assistant in an undergraduate agricultural economics class Rouelle took in the fall semester.

"I saw his picture, and I was like, 'Good Lord,'" Rouelle said.

Huan Li felt just as shocked when she learned what had happened in the café, where Zhu and Yang were seen talking quietly shortly before the slaying.

Like Zhu, Li came to Tech in August. She wasn't close with Zhu, but she said he always seemed nice and said hello whenever their paths crossed.

Zhu revealed little about himself on his page at Facebook.com, the social-networking Web site. He posted pictures of himself in the front the U.S. Capitol, at Lane Stadium during a Tech football game and standing next to one of the dozens of Hokie Bird statues around Blacksburg.

"I think most people who know him feel like I am," said Li, who knew Zhu but not Yang. "His friends really don't know why he did this. He didn't show anything before this happened. He looked very normal. It happened so suddenly."

Zhu is being held without bond at the Montgomery County Jail. He is scheduled to appear March 5 for a preliminary hearing in Montgomery Country General District Court in Blacksburg.

When the first officer arrived Wednesday night at the café in response to a 911 call, she saw Zhu holding Yang's severed head in his hand, according to an affidavit filed in Montgomery County Circuit Court.

The Montgomery County Sheriff's Office executed a search warrant on Zhu's and Yang's residences.

The following items were retrieved from Zhu's apartment in the Sturbridge Square complex: Softworks utility knife papers, chef's knife papers, a bag from a local supermarket, a purple digital camera, medical information pamphlets, Verizon statements, thumb drives for a computer and a book entitled "The Company of Strangers."

From Yang's residence at Donaldson Brown, an investigator took a check made out to Zhu for $40; a camera phone and charger; a pink diary; thumb drives and memory sticks for a computer; and a letter that hadn't been mailed. The search warrant results noted that the letter had a "red kiss on seal."

http://www.timesdispatch.com/rtd/new...210009/187261/

**Sister Iroz** · January 24th, 2009, 02:10 PM

BLACKSBURG, Va. (AP) -- A Virginia Tech graduate student accused of beheading a fellow student displayed erratic and standoffish behavior in the months before the attack on campus this week, his landlord said Friday.

Also on Friday, police filed court papers listing items found in a search of the off-campus town house occupied by Haiyang Zhu, who is charged with first-degree murder in the slaying of Xin Yang, as well as the room where Yang lived on campus.

Yang, of Beijing, was slain with a large kitchen knife as she had coffee with the 25-year-old Zhu on Wednesday night at a cafe in the building where she lived, a hotel converted into graduate student housing.

A Tech police officer arrived Wednesday night to find Zhu holding the 22-year-old Yang's head in his hands, according to a court affidavit filed Thursday. Zhu is being held without bond in the slaying, the first on campus since a gunman killed 32 people and then himself in April 2007.

While a fellow teaching assistant described Zhu as personable, his landlord at Sturbridge Square Apartments said the student behaved oddly and was "belligerent" at times.

Landlord Will Segar said Zhu refused to turn on the heat in the apartment he rented with two others, and as a result the pipes froze and burst. When Segar installed a thermostat that kept the heat at 65 degrees, he said Zhu shut off a breaker in the electric box so the heat wouldn't run.

"He was definitely a combative guy," Segar said, adding that Zhu also recently accused the leasing staff of stealing his shoes.

At the apartment, investigators found a camera, computer file storage equipment and phone records, according to court documents filed Friday. Investigators took a computer, cell phone, camera, planners and a diary from Yang's room.

An unmailed letter in Yang's room had a red "kiss" on the seal, the court filing said, but did not say to whom it was addressed.

Investigators also found a $40 check made out to Zhu in Yang's room, a further clue the two were well acquainted with each other. A university official has said Zhu was helping her settle into her new surroundings after her arrival at Virginia Tech on Jan. 8 to seek a master's degree in accounting.

Segar said Zhu brought Yang to the leasing office to apply for an apartment last week.

"He was definitely in charge," Segar said of Zhu. He described Yang as "very meek and very nervous."

Fellow teaching assistant Ken Stanton said he didn't know Zhu well but had observed that he had good social skills.

"He had friends and he was a TA," said Stanton, 30, who is studying engineering education. "You can't be a TA and not be social."

A preliminary hearing has been set for March 5 for Zhu, a doctoral student in agricultural and applied economics from Ningbo, China who arrived at the school in August. His attorney, Stephanie Cox, has not returned calls seeking comment.

Virginia Tech Police were trying to verify the authenticity of a posting on a Chinese-language blog earlier this month under the name Haiyang Zhu that expressed frustration over problems including stock losses, Chief Wendell Flinchum said Friday.

The Jan. 7 posting said, "Recently I've been so frustrated I think only of killing someone or committing suicide."

Three representatives of the Chinese Embassy met with Virginia Tech officials on Friday discuss how the school could assist Yang's family and how the U.S. court system works, among other things, said university spokesman Larry Hincker.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories...MPLATE=DEFAULT

**Sister Iroz** · January 26th, 2009, 10:48 PM

BLACKSBURG, Va. (AP) - Hundreds gathered at Virginia Tech for a Chinese New Year celebration, which included a dedication to a 22-year-old Chinese graduate student who was killed in her first week of classes.

Several university officials, including President Charles Steger, attended Sunday's event and spoke of the loss of Xin Yang, who was killed Wednesday in a cafe at the Graduate Life Center. A small memorial outside the auditorium included a book in which visitors could write messages to Yang's family.

Y.A. Liu, adviser for the Association of Chinese Student Scholars, said Yang's parents are scheduled to arrive in Blacksburg this week.

http://www.nbc12.com/Global/story.as...&nav=menu128_2

**PoongyPrincess** · February 17th, 2009, 04:05 PM

None of the articles say how far the other seven people in the cafe were from the violence. If they were sitting and eating, and focused on their food, studying, or their friends then the poor girl was probably already dead before anyone really realized what was happening.

**Sister Iroz** · April 19th, 2010, 04:12 PM

A former Virginia Tech graduate student who prosecutors said decapitated a classmate in a campus cafe because she rejected his romantic advances was sentenced to life in prison on Monday.

Montgomery County Circuit Judge Robert Turk sentenced Haiyang Zhu to life without parole, said Commonwealth's Attorney Brad Finch. Zhu pleaded guilty in December to first-degree murder in the death of fellow Chinese student Xin Yang. He admitted decapitating the 22-year-old Yang as the pair had coffee at a campus eatery in January 2009.

Zhu's plea did not qualify for the death penalty under Virginia law.

Finch said he was pleased that the judge imposed the maximum punishment for the "extremely brutal murder."

Zhu's attorney, Stephanie Cox, did not immediately return a phone message seeking comment. But Zhu apologized at the hearing to the victim's family and the community, Finch said.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2...ife-in-prison/