Police: Kansas psychiatrist stabbed to death by his patient

WICHITA, Kan. - A psychiatrist was stabbed to death in an alley behind his holistic practice in Kansas and a man identified as one of his patients has been arrested in the killing, police said Thursday.

Dr. Achutha Reddy, 57, was killed in the attack Wednesday evening at the Holistic Psychiatry Services clinic in Wichita. Police Lt. Todd Ojile said the suspect in custody was Reddy's client, but that authorities do not know what prompted the attack.

CBS affiliate KWCH reports records show 21-year-old Umar Dutt was arrested Wednesday on a first-degree murder charge and is being held a the Sedgwick County Jail on a $1 million bond.

Ojile said investigators expect the case to be presented to the district attorney's office on Friday.

Police said the suspect and Reddy had been seen entering the clinic together earlier in the day. The suspect left and later returned, and the two entered an office together. The office manager heard a disturbance, found the client assaulting the doctor and tried to intervene, allowing Reddy to flee the building. The suspect followed Reddy into the alley where the doctor was stabbed multiple times, Ojile said.

The suspect was arrested later after a security guard at the Wichita Country Club called police because a bloodied man was sitting in a vehicle in the parking lot.

Struggling to contain her grief, Reddy's widow Beena said she doesn't know why he would have wanted to kill her husband. She said Achutha Reddy was adored by his family and his patients, and that he was "a very good man."

"He was so devoted — so devoted to his patients, so devoted to his family," she said. "He was truly a wonderful man, a wonderful physician."

Holistic Psychiatric Services says on its website that it "serves the needs of your mind, spirit, and body." 

Brenda Trammel, the outpatient clinician at Holistic Psychiatry Services, read a statement calling Reddy "an amazing, compassionate man that was kind and loving to anyone he met. He had a gift of knowing what each and every one of us needed and gave it freely. He would often tell me you have to live life to the fullest and this is how he lived his life."

She said Reddy thought of himself as "our father" and believed it was his job to guide them to do well in their lives.

"He expected the best from all of us and we gave it to him with the same abandon he gave to us," Trammel said. "The senselessness of this action bears heavy on all of our souls."