Police: Le’s Murder is Targeted Killing

The police says, 24-year-old graduate student whose body was found in a medical building of Yale University had made no complaints about being stalked or harassed in the weeks before her death. Wednesday DNA and hair samples from a lab technician were described as a “person of interest” in the case.

Photo: Police: Le’s Murder is Targeted Killing

On Tuesday night, law enforcement officials took Raymond Clark III into custody at a Middletown, Conn., apartment complex.

The technician, Raymond Clark III, 24, was released at 3 a.m. Wednesday after complying with a search warrant to take the samples, said Joe Avery, a spokesman for the New Haven police. Mr. Clark had been a focus for investigators at least since Monday, when unmarked police cars pulled up to the apartment complex in Middletown, Conn., where he lives.

The body of the graduate student, Annie Le, was found Sunday in a basement wall inside the building. The case has been classified as a homicide, but the cause of death has yet to be released publicly, the New York Times reports.

It was also reported, New Haven police chief James Lewis said police were hoping to compare Clark's DNA to more than 150 pieces of evidence collected from the crime scene. That evidence may also be compared with DNA samples from others with access to the crime scene.

"We're going to narrow this down," Lewis told The Associated Press. "We're going to do this as quickly as we can."

More than a dozen police and FBI agents stormed the apartment building that's home to Clark, an animal research technician whom New Haven authorities said Tuesday night was a focus of their investigation into the death of Annie Le.

Le's body was found Sunday stuffed in a wall at a lab to which Clark also had access.

Clark's attorney, David Dworski of Fairfield, declined to comment on Clark's current location.

"We're committed to proceeding appropriately with the authorities with whom we are in regular communication," Dworski said.

A resident of the complex, Rick Tarallo said he, his wife and 6-month-old daughter live in a unit next to Clark and his fiancee, Jennifer Hromadka. The two are to be married Dec. 20, 2011, according to a listing on a wedding Web site.

Tarallo said the couple was "really quiet" and lived with an older man, whom he speculated was one of their fathers.

"He seemed like a good guy," Tarallo said of Clark. "They didn't strike me as someone who would try to kill somebody," Newsday reports.

In the meantime, police say it was a targeted killing and other students are not in danger.

Ms Le's fiance is not a suspect and has helped police with the investigation, BBC reports.