A young man was shot to death at Indiana’s Purdue University Tuesday, and a male suspect was taken into custody, police said, in an apparently targeted killing, adding to the rush of school shootings this past year.
The gunman and student, Cody Cousins, 23, fatally shot Andrew Boldt, 21, who was a graduate student and teacher’s assistant at the university’s electrical engineering building, according to Purdue University Police Chief John Cox.
“The individual entered the facility and took the actions that he took, and then immediately left the facility without any other interaction that we’re aware of,” Cox said.
Cousins gave himself up to a West Lafayette police officer outside the building on the 40,000-student campus, he said.
(image) Andrew BoldtApparently Cousins was not cooperating with investigators, initially, even though he had surrendered.
Purdue security officials issued a text alert to warn those on campus and in the surrounding area that there had been a shooting, and to seek shelter immediately. Within two hours, the university said there was no ongoing threat on campus and allowed normal operations to resume in all buildings except the engineering facility, which was now a crime scene.
Many students described chaos on the campus.
Julissa Martinez, a freshman nursing student from Portage, said she was in class in a different building when she received the text message saying the university was on lockdown. She explained that her professor briefly kept teaching, then stopped so that students could contact people to let them know they were safe.
“He tried to get everything under control because people were freaking out,” she said.
She said students were nervous because there was a lot of speculation about the severity of the situation.
“It was scary because you hear about it, but you never expect it to happen on your campus,” Martinez said.
Senior Saran Mishra, editor of the Purdue Exponent, the campus newspaper, said some students had heard fire alarms and were told to evacuate.
“Right now I’m still in shock,” he said.