Student held in deadly UT attack
Knife rampage leaves 1 dead, 3 hurt; police trying to determine motive
A student at the University of Texas at Austin, wielding a large Bowie-like hunting knife, is suspected of stabbing four other students on campus Monday afternoon, killing one of them, police said.
Kendrex J. White, a 21-year-old junior from Killeen, offered no resistance when officers tackled him within minutes of the stabbings.
The four victims, three white males and one Asian male ages 20 and 21, were attacked separately and without apparent provocation, police said.
Harrison Brown, identified as the student who died, was a 2016 graduate of Graham High School, northwest of Dallas, according to a Facebook post by the school district. The names of the three surviving students, who were treated at University Medical Center Brackenridge, were not immediately released.
Police were trying to determine if the assailant had a motive or randomly picked victims along the bustling walkway outside of Gregory Gymnasium in East Campus during the final week of spring classes.
Rachel Prichett, a UT freshman, had just left her last class of the day when she walked by the gym.
“I heard a couple people scream,” she recalled about an hour later. “I thought they were joking with each other, until I turned around and saw a guy … holding a small machete-type thing.”
Prichett saw the attacker walk up behind another man, grab his shoulder and stab him in the back. She said that attack happened so close to her that she could have reached out and touched the victim.
“Then I turned around and started running,” she said. “While I was running, I saw this guy sitting at a table that was slumped over and bloody. Apparently, no one had seen him get hurt.”
Prichett said the attacker had escaped attention by blending in.
“He was just walking around very calmly with the knife down by his side,” Prichett said after she reunited with her boyfriend near the scene of the attack. “You wouldn’t have seen it unless you were paying attention.”
A photo showed bike patrol police officers handcuffing a young man with a long, leather knife sheath hanging from his belt.
The attacks, reported to police about 1:50 p.m. set off a panic as students scrambled for safety while word spread on social media sites.
“Dude, I saw three people bleeding one by your dorm and 2 by Greg,” one student tweeted.
Some students complained UT was slow to alert people about an attacker on campus. Later, an alert sent at 2:14 p.m. said a suspect was in custody and there was no immediate threat to the campus.
White graduated from Killeen High School in 2014, according to a Facebook page that appears to belong to him. On what appears to be his Twitter account, he said he was a “future doctor” studying biology.
He is an active member of the Black Health Professionals Organization student group on campus, said Melody Adindu, the group’s new president. She said White was passionate about his work and was “very interactive and easygoing.”
Some of White’s former classmates at Killeen High School, near the gates of the Fort Hood Army post, had similar recollections of him.
“He was a really smart guy in high school. He was always nice, had plenty of friends and was in the International Baccalaureate program. I’m definitely surprised he would do this,” Kay’ Lynn Wilkerson told the Killeen Daily Herald.
The police chief did not know if the stabbings were related to recent threats made against a few campus fraternities. Police were interviewing more than 25 witnesses.
UT President Greg Fenves issued a statement that said: “Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their families. This breaks my heart that any of our students are touched by tragedy.”
Gov. Greg Abbott responded to the stabbings and a separate shooting in Dallas in which a paramedic was critically injured.
“Our prayers go out to all those affected by today’s tragic events,” he said in an emailed statement. “As the investigations into these heinous crimes continue, I have offered all available state resources to both Dallas and the University of Texas to assist in any effort.”
The campus has been the scene of other violence in recent years. Over a year ago, the body of an 18-year-old student was found strangled to death along a creek that runs through the campus.