WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. ― Purdue grad student Xiaojia Zhou stalked two of his professors, whom he blamed for a failed test last week and for ruining his life, according to prosecutors’ probable cause affidavit.
Charges are expected to be filed Thursday. Meanwhile, he remains incarcerated at the Tippecanoe County Jail in lieu of bond, according to jail records.
Police alerted the consulate for 44-year-old Zhou, who is a Chinese citizen.
Zhou confided with his landlord earlier this month about the fact he rode his bicycle to the area of Redfree Drive in rural West Lafayette, where he lay in a marshy area behind his professors’ house. He watched the professors Friday while being bitten by mosquitoes, according to the affidavit.
The two political science professors told police they have no ill will toward Zhou and were alarmed that he was allegedly stalking them, according to the affidavit.
Zhou asked whether his landlord was diabetic and used insulin, explaining that he believed someone could kill a person by injecting them with insulin, and it would not be detectable, according to the affidavit. He also asked whether the ether sold at car stores is the same ether used to anesthetize patients in medical procedures, according to the affidavit.
“Zhou keeps getting weirder and weirder,” the landlord told police, according to the affidavit.
One time that is not specified in the court record, the landlord found Zhou sitting naked on the apartment’s front porch in the 1100 block of South Street in Lafayette. He also bought a handgun from someone at a gas station, which is not identified, but he bought the wrong caliber ammunition.
He handed the gun, which he bought in the spring, to the landlord for safe keeping while he was in a mental health facility, according to the affidavit. The affidavit does not specify when he was in the facility or when he was released. When he got out, he asked for it back, but he learned the landlord had surrendered it to police, where he could go to claim it.
A woman reported Zhou cut her hair while he was sitting in the pew behind her in church a few months ago, according to the affidavit.
Zhou currently is enrolled and a graduate student in political science program, according to Purdue spokesman Trevor Peters.
“He currently is persona non grata based on the police report,” Peters said, noting that he cannot release any additional information about Zhou or his case because of the pending investigation.
Zhou is the second Purdue student suspected of crimes that might be tied to mental health breakdowns.
On Oct. 5, 2022, Ji Min Sha, a Korean undergrad student at Purdue, killed his roommate, Varun Manish Chheda, inside their dorm room at McCutcheon Hall.
More: Purdue murder suspect Ji Min Sha’s case still on hold pending mental health improvement
Sha believes he is a CIA operative, according to previous hearings in which he has been determined to be incompetent to stand trial. Sha currently is being treated at the State Hospital in Logansport in attempts to restore his health so he can be tried on murder charges.
Reach Ron Wilkins at [email protected]. Follow on Twitter: @RonWilkins2.
This article originally appeared on Lafayette Journal & Courier: Stalking charges expected Thursday against Purdue grad student
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