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Socially awkward and severely disturbed, 26-year-old Singaporean A*Star scholar Ouyang Xiangyu has been arrested and charged in California with poisoning herself and her Stanford University classmates.
The second-year student at Stanford's School of Medicine had put paraformaldehye (PFA) in her drinking water and her classmate's water bottles, The New Paper reports.
A commonly used substance in biology, PFA is usually used to take samples from cell tissue and can react with internal organs — and definitely lethal just by ingesting a few drops.
Two of her classmates had drunk the tainted water and complained of a burning sensation in their mouths and throats. In a testimony that a student gave to police, she began salivating uncontrollably, and her throat began burning so bad that she could not swallow the water, VICE reports.
Ouyang, however, claimed that she did not experience any adverse reaction when she added PFA and other chemicals to her own water bottle.
Though she may have not succeeded in seriously injuring anyone so far, she has probably ruined some of her classmate's academic grades — Ouyang allegedly destroyed some of the projects that the other cancer biology students were working on.
In court, she pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to four counts of poisoning. Court papers revealed that she had been suffering from severe insomnia, dizziness, depression and a "disconnection from reality", and she had even sought psychological care from the university prior to the poisoning incident.
Since the incident was uncovered last November, she is no longer a student at Stanford after the university issued a Stay Away Letter.
Previously a student at Temasek Junior College, she went on to graduate with a degree in bio-chemistry from Imperial College in London under the A*Star National Science Scholarship.
Ouyang is currently out on $50,000 bail, awaiting psychiatric evaluation and a May court date.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Got a tip? Send it to us at singapore@coconuts.co.
Socially awkward and severely disturbed, 26-year-old Singaporean A*Star scholar Ouyang Xiangyu has been arrested and charged in California with poisoning herself and her Stanford University classmates.
The second-year student at Stanford's School of Medicine had put paraformaldehye (PFA) in her drinking water and her classmate's water bottles, The New Paper reports.
A commonly used substance in biology, PFA is usually used to take samples from cell tissue and can react with internal organs — and definitely lethal just by ingesting a few drops.
Two of her classmates had drunk the tainted water and complained of a burning sensation in their mouths and throats. In a testimony that a student gave to police, she began salivating uncontrollably, and her throat began burning so bad that she could not swallow the water, VICE reports.
Ouyang, however, claimed that she did not experience any adverse reaction when she added PFA and other chemicals to her own water bottle.
Though she may have not succeeded in seriously injuring anyone so far, she has probably ruined some of her classmate's academic grades — Ouyang allegedly destroyed some of the projects that the other cancer biology students were working on.
In court, she pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to four counts of poisoning. Court papers revealed that she had been suffering from severe insomnia, dizziness, depression and a "disconnection from reality", and she had even sought psychological care from the university prior to the poisoning incident.
Since the incident was uncovered last November, she is no longer a student at Stanford after the university issued a Stay Away Letter.
Previously a student at Temasek Junior College, she went on to graduate with a degree in bio-chemistry from Imperial College in London under the A*Star National Science Scholarship.
Ouyang is currently out on $50,000 bail, awaiting psychiatric evaluation and a May court date.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons