RALEIGH, N.C. — Police in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where a professor was fatally shot on a college campus this week, received information on the suspect’s identity within minutes of the gunfire, according to a recording of the 911 call.
Some portions of the audio sound redacted, but what was released describes the first moments after Monday’s shooting of Associate Professor Zijie Yan inside a science building in the heart of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Police said they arrested Tailei Qi, 34, of Chapel Hill, without force off campus less than two hours after the shooting.
Qi was charged early Tuesday with first-degree murder and a weapons count and jailed without bond. Yan was Qi’s faculty adviser and Qi worked with Yan’s research group.
The attack and hours-long lockdown terrified students and faculty who returned last week for the start of the fall semester. Several hundred people attended a candlelight vigil honoring Yan on Wednesday. Classes resumed Thursday at the flagship campus.
UNC Police Chief Brian James said earlier this week that a 911 caller reported gunfire around 1 p.m. Monday at Caudill Labs, which was Yan’s primary work location. Qi was not at the building when officers arrived soon after, James said.
In the 4½-minute recording released on Thursday by UNC-Chapel Hill to The Associated Press, the distressed, unidentified caller could be heard telling others to “close the doors and stay inside. There’s an active shooter.”
“Do you have a description of him?” the emergency operator asks.
“I know exactly who it is,” the caller responds, spelling out Qi’s name. “And he has a gun and he’s on campus.”
The caller then described what the suspect was wearing and said “I saw him leaving the building” in the direction of another laboratory facility next door.
“You can look him up on our website,” the caller said. “You can see a picture right there of him.”
Police later released a photo of what…
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