Police arrest lab technician in Yale student murder

BOSTON (Reuters) – A Yale University lab technician was charged on Thursday with the murder of a graduate student whose body was found inside a wall on the New Haven, Connecticut, campus the day she was to be married.

Raymond Clark, 24, was arraigned hours after being taken away in handcuffs by police who charged him with murdering Annie Le, a pharmacology student whose body was hidden in the basement of the laboratory building where they both worked.

Clark was grilled on Wednesday by police, who used DNA testing in their investigation. New Haven Police Chief James Lewis told a news conference there were no other suspects.

"This is not about urban crime, university crime or domestic crime but an issue of workplace violence, which is becoming a growing concern around the country," Lewis said.

The case has shocked students at the Ivy League university, whose campus is secured by dozens of surveillance cameras and requires ID swipe cards to access buildings.

Marks on Le's body indicated she was strangled or asphyxiated using some kind of weapon. She vanished last week and after an intensive five-day search police found her body on Sunday, the day she had planned to wed her college sweetheart.

Clark had worked at the Yale campus for several years and was in the same building where Le, also 24, carried out her research. His duties included tending to the laboratory research animals and cleaning their cages.

Clark is being held on a $3 million bond and is due back in court in early October. Yale University President Richard Levin said Clark had been barred from the campus and his Yale ID card disenabled.

Students at Yale held a candlelit vigil near Le's laboratory earlier this week.