This archive report was first published on 13 December 2019.
On December 13, 2019, a law enforcement official confirmed that a teenage boy had been taken into custody in connection with the killing of Tessa Majors, an 18-year-old Barnard student who was fatally stabbed in Morningside Park.
According to investigators, the boy was part of a group that attacked Ms. Majors on Wednesday night as she was walking through the park near her campus.
However, the police were unsure what role the teenager played in the stabbing and had yet to charge him with a crime, the official said.
Detectives were also looking at other people who may have been involved in the attack, according to the official.
Ms. Majors, a first-year college student from Virginia who was interested in journalism and played in a rock band, was walking in the park when she was approached by one to three people near West 116th Street and Morningside Drive.
There was a struggle, and one of the assailants pulled out a knife and stabbed Ms. Majors several times, Chief Rodney Harrison of the Police Department's chief of detectives said.
The attackers then fled, and Ms. Majors staggered up a flight of stairs, out of the park and onto the street, where a campus security guard found her.
Ms. Majors was taken to Mount Sinai St. Luke's hospital, where she died from her injuries, Chief Harrison said.
