FBI Investigating UMD Fatal Stabbing As Possible Hate Crime
BALTIMORE (WJZ) -- A fatal stabbing at University of Maryland, College Park is now being investigated as a possible hate crime. The FBI is now digging into the suspects' social media history for answers.
Police have identified the victim from the early Saturday stabbing as 23-year-old Richard Collins III.
He had just been commissioned into the army as a lieutenant and was due to graduate from Bowie State University on Tuesday.
Police arrested 22-year-old Sean Christopher Urbanski of fatally stabbing Collins on Regents Dr. near Montgomery Hall.
Urbanski faces charges of first and second-degree murder, and first-degree assault for the deadly stabbing.
RELATED: Bowie State Student Fatally Stabbed At UMD College Park
The suspect is a member of a white supremacist group on Facebook called "Alt-Reich Nation," which contains racist material.
"Suffices to say that it's despicable. It shows extreme bias towards women, latinos, members of the Jewish faith, and especially African Americans," says University of Maryland Police Chief David Mitchell.
University of Maryland Police Department reports the stabbing happened just after 3 a.m. on Saturday, just a day before graduation.
Urbanski was caught on camera, police say, launching an unprovoked, random attack on a Bowie State student waiting at a bus stop.
Collins was visiting campus and was waiting for a ride home when he encountered Urbanski.
Police say Urbanski approached three people with a knife, screaming, then stabbed the 23-year-old student in the chest, killing him.
Flowers now lay where Collins was found by officers with serious injuries on the sidewalk.
He was taken to a local hospital, where he was later pronounced dead. Officers were later able to find and identify Urbanski based on witness accounts.
The challenge now: to calm this community's fears. The NAACP says they are taking steps towards bringing students together.
"I mean this group hates women, they hate Jewish. You know, that could have been a Jewish kid out there. It could have been anyone, it could have been me," says Maryland NAACP President Gerald Stansbury.
At Commencement Sunday, President Wallace Loh invited University of Maryland graduates to join him in a moment of silence.
"I want to express our profound sorrow and anguish for this horrific tragedy. We are all in shock that a young man so full of promise should have his life cut short so suddenly," says Dr. Loh.
A traumatic, random attack, rocking two universities to their core.
Urbanski is being held without bond for the charges against him.
Bowie State is planning to have a vigil for Lt. Collins Monday evening.
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