U.S. student girl beat her roommate with hot iron

A U.S. college freshman was charged with assault after authorities say she beat her new roommate with a hot clothes iron, hitting her so hard she fractured the young woman's skull and broke the iron into pieces.

The 18-year-old victim told authorities her roommate attacked her following their first day of classes after accusing her of putting a hidden camera in their room.

Heather Haase suffered a skull fracture, bruises, cuts and a burn on her arm in the early morning attack on Tuesday, university police said.

Her roommate, Sharronda Barkley, also 18, told officers Haase injured herself when she fell out of bed and hit the iron, according to a police report. Barkley was being held on $25,000 bond Thursday. A judge ordered her not to return to Bowling Green State University or have contact with Haase.

Freshmen arrived last week at the university, 20 miles (30 kilometers) south of Toledo. Barkley is from a Cleveland suburb; Haase is from a small town in northeast Ohio.

"You have two young ladies that go off to college with an expectation of obtaining an education and hopefully having a good time, and they're not here a week and one of them is severely injured and the other ends up in jail," University Police Chief James Wiegand said. "That's not the way it's supposed to go."