Do you think that article makes her powerful? We can agree to disagree...I think she was targeted because she picked out a dynamite dissertation for her research and was going to be in the way of a few. I believe Annie to be brilliant, she's much like a sponge and gets things done with effort that looks easy. Research is so competitive!. Every piece of research that is published and snatched up by a drug company, or turned into a patent is worth a fortune. I can't discount that power she would have had as she researched her way to fame nor those who would never clap for her success.
I don't believe she was targeted b/c of her research. At a top research university like Yale, grad students would be dropping like flies if they were killed off every time they picked a sensitive topic for a dissertation.
Annie was the TA for Bennett's(not correct - wasn't bennett's class) Pathology class - he cancelled it before she was reported missing. The building she started her day in and left her purse etc. (Sterling Hall of Medicine)
I'm going to speculate... sometime around noon, co-workers tell Bennett that she's gone missing (he may not have been in the lab area - they could have called him at his office or elsewhere?). I believe it's been stated that he's young? If so, it's likely that he might be unfamiliar with what the procedure would be in the case of a missing student, and instead of calling police he might have notified his superior - who could have assumed it was just a case of the student "taking off" for the day, and told Bennett to just go ahead and cancel the class. If the superior didn't personally know Le, he might have been unfamiliar with her work ethic and been unconcerned with her absence.
If she was a TA for a pathology class, then her labwork would be related to prepping for the afternoon class. If she had not shown up that morning in lab, then perhaps there wasn't going to be much to work on/discuss in class. However, being the first day of class, it seems like they would've gone ahead and met, handed out the syllabus, etc. When I was a doctoral student, I was a TA (an assistant one year and an instructor two other years), and if I was going to miss a class or be late, there was always someone you could find to show up temporarily, even to say I was running late.
But a friend and fellow student, Xiao Hung, told Fox 5 News that on a prior occasion near the building, Le "had been approached by other people and she managed to get in the car and escape from that incident."
http://www.websleuths.com/forums/newreply.php?do=newreply&noquote=1&p=4152292
Do we know any more about this incident?
Now this is interesting. This may be why Bennett contacted the Dept Head immediately and also why the roommate got suspicious that evening. They knew something had happened before and they were concerned this time. Contacting a Dept Head to cancel a class isn't usually necessary, I wouldn't think. Dept Heads have more to worry about that each class that's cancelled, etc. But for a grad student to be a 'no show' under suspicious circumstances who had also been targeted before - now *that* would be a reason to go up the ladder.
I personally think that someone was stalking her, my thought is based on the article she wrote about crime on campus, I also feel that this stalking knew she was about to be married and wanted to get her before that happned....
My gut instinct on this one from the beginning is that there's someone, maybe another student/lab worker who had become infatuated with Annie and things escalated as her wedding approached. When they saw she actually planned to go through with the wedding, they became panicked and angry.
This is what I think, too. Last chance before she gets married.
Bennett's class didn't start until 10:30am. This means he possibly had 30 minutes prior to his rock solid alibi of teaching a class until noon.
The actual time of the fire alarm was at 12:40pm.
*IF* Bennett is involved, then this makes sense. The autaclave thing is strange - if someone were planning to murder someone in a lab, instruments could be the "weapon of choice". Sterilizing them should (?) erase any DNA evidence or fingerprints, etc. Perhaps the alarm was to (1) give someone a chance to get her out unnoticed in the mayhem, (2) provide a focus in the building other than where her body was so it could be removed unnoticed, or (3) an accident b/c they were nervous and focused on trying to sterlize the possible murder weapons.
Wow. Enough of this for now! Back to painting the fence. After spending time on this board, I'm always glad for my family and go hug my kids *alot*.
God bless her family.
