HILLSBOROUGH, N.C. (AP) — A University of North Carolina graduate student walked into a classroom building, shot his faculty advisor and then left, authorities said Tuesday about the attack that led to a lockdown on the Chapel Hill campus while police searched for the attacker.
Tailei Qi, 34, was charged Tuesday with first-degree murder in Monday’s killing of Zijie Yan inside of a science building on the state’s flagship public university.
UNC Police Chief Brian Jones said at a news conference Tuesday that Chapel Hill police arrested Qi in a residential neighborhood near campus. Police didn't need to use force when arresting him. He said investigators were still trying to determine a motive for the attack and were still searching for the gun used to kill the victim.
Yan, a father to two young children, was an associate professor in the Department of Applied Physical Sciences who had worked for the university since 2019, UNC said in a statement Tuesday. He led the Yan Research Group, which Qi joined last year, according to the group’s UNC webpage. He earned his PhD in materials engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York and previously worked as an assistant professor at Clarkson University.
Qi is a graduate student in the department of applied physical sciences who studies nanopartical synthesis and light-matter interaction. In a page that has been taken down since the attack, Qi was listed on the school’s website as a graduate student in Yan’s research group and Yan was listed as his adviser. He previously studied at Wuhan University in China before moving to the U.S. and earning a masters in mechanical engineering at Louisiana State University in 2021.
The attack led to a roughly three-hour lockdown on the UNC campus. No one else was hurt in the attack.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
HILLSBOROUGH, N.C. (AP) — Authorities charged a University of North Carolina graduate student Tuesday with first-degree murder in the fatal shooting of his faculty advisor, in an attack that caused a campuswide lockdown while police searched for the gunman.
During a brief hearing, Orange County Superior Court Judge Sherri Murrell ordered 34-year-old Tailei Qi to remain jailed without bond as an interpreter explained to Qi in Mandarin what was happening. She scheduled his next court date for Sept. 18.
When the hearing ended, Qi bowed to his interpreter, his attorney and the guards before they took him away in handcuffs. Dana Graves, a public defender who represented Qi at the hearing, left the courtroom without talking to reporters.
Qi is charged with first-degree murder and having a 9mm handgun on educational property in the Monday killing of Zijie Yan inside of a science building on UNC's flagship campus in Chapel Hill. The attack led to a roughly three-hour lockdown of the campus, a week after students returned for the start of the fall semester.
Authorities haven't publicly discussed a possible motive for the attack.
Yan, a father to two young children, was an associate professor in the Department of Applied Physical Sciences who had worked for the university since 2019, UNC said in a statement Tuesday.
Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz said in a message to the UNC community that his team had met with Yan’s colleagues and family to express condolences on behalf of the campus.
“He was a beloved colleague, mentor and a friend of so many on our campus and a father to two young children,” Guskiewicz said of Yan at a Tuesday news conference.
On Wednesday, the school’s iconic Bell Tower will ring in honor of Yan’s memory and students are encouraged to take a moment of silence, he wrote. The school also canceled classes through Wednesday.