Ex-Va. Tech student pleads guilty in decapitation

[Blue_Tires]

CHRISTIANSBURG, Va. — A former Virginia Tech graduate student pleaded guilty Monday to decapitating a classmate, and prosecutors for the first time revealed the reason for the campus cafe killing, saying his romantic advances had been rejected.

Prosecutors described in detail a heartbroken Haiyang Zhu (hy-yuhng-joo) who had had fallen in love with Xin Yang (shin yuhng), only to be rebuffed when she told him she had a boyfriend she planned to marry. Previously, authorities had been tightlipped about what led to the killing.

Zhu, who faces up to life in prison, did not say at the plea hearing why he killed Yang. He quietly anwered questions in English.

"Your honor, I plead guilty," he said, his hands shackled to a chain circling his waist.

Prosecutor Brad Finch said on the morning of the killing Jan. 21, Zhu bought the 8-inch butcher knife used in the murder, two other knives and a claw hammer. He also called the 22-year-old woman a dozen times after buying the weapons.

Finch cited a letter Zhu wrote while in jail, which said Yang's rejection "forced him to kill her" because "he loved her too much."

"Xin broke his heart on the morning of January 20th when she told him that she had a boyfriend and that they planned to get married," the letter said, according to Finch.

The killing stunned a campus that still had vivid memories of the mass slayings in April 2007, when a student gunman shot 32 people and then took his own life. The stabbing was the first slaying on campus since then.

Zhu's first-degree murder plea did not qualify for the death penalty under Virginia law, but Finch said he would seek the maximum penalty. Virginia does not have parole.

Before the killing, Zhu penned what Finch termed a love letter that was found in her dorm room. The letter was written shortly after Zhu first met her and indicated he had "fallen deeply in love."

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iKA_YVIl5diORwPWVK7NjTqvPDXwD9CNSH680

[rd_kent]

1. Very sad. Too bad there was not a knife ban, this could have been prevented....

[Berry Cool]

2. If I had decpitated every man who rejected me romatically up to this point in my life,

there'd be a blanket of bodies strewn across three states and two countries.

She "forced him to kill her." "He loved her too much."

When are we going to get sick of men preying on women in the name of love?

[Gwendolyn]

3. Blech, sicko. Rot in jail forever.

:puke: