CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (WVIR) – One person is fighting for their life and another is in custody following a stabbing near UVA Grounds Thursday evening.
Charlottesville Police has named Edward Conlin Lee, 44, as the suspect in the attack.
Lee, of Charlottesville, is being charged with malicious wounding.
Police said Lee and the victim know each other. As of Thursday night, the victim was at UVA Medical Center in critical condition with stab wounds to his torso.
Police reported that neither the victim nor the suspect has a known affiliation with the university.
According to police, Lee and the victim were at Wesley Memorial United Methodist Church before the stabbing happened. It was there the two got into an altercation.
The victim was found a block away.
Shortly before 5 p.m. Thursday evening, the university sent out an emergency alert that there was an active attacker with a knife across from Alumni Hall near 100 Emmet Street.
“I take this path every morning and, yeah, it’s pretty crazy. Not something I would have thought would happen my first year of college,” UVA first year Bertie Azqueta said.
The university later followed up with an alert to shelter in place.
“My commerce class had just finished, and I saw it on the screen of somebody’s computer, like “alert,” and then I checked my own phone and was like, oh yeah, this is actually real,” UVA first year Rohan Suri said.
By 6.pm., the university sent another alert, reporting the suspect was found near Stribling Avenue and placed in custody.
This comes just two days after the University sent out a separate shelter in place, after a police pursuit led to a suspect fleeing on Grounds, shutting down the university for hours.
In what has been a chaotic week on grounds, students near the scene Thursday told 29News they are starting to feel the effects.
“It’s not normal I don’t think,” UVA third year student Amy Bley said.
“It’s almost become a little routine now and it’s upsetting to even feel that way,” Azqueta said.
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