Virginina Tech police said a female resident of the Graduate Life Center was stabbed to death in the center's Au Bon Pain coffee shop at 7:06 p.m. in an apparent domestic assault.

The suspect, a male graduate student who lives off campus, was taken into custody minutes after the incident, Tech police Chief Wendell Flinchum said. Police say the two had a relationship, but the nature of it is unclear.
 
Neither the victim nor the suspect are being identified, pending notification of the victim's next of kin. Both are Asian students.
 
The Graduate Life Center at the intersection of Otey Street and College Avenue opened for the 2005-06 school year in the former Donaldson Brown hotel as Tech's first-ever graduate student housing area. It houses more than 100 students.
 
Student Ken Stanton said he had exchanged text messages with a friend who is in law enforcement who was a first responder to the scene, but he declined to identify the friend.
 
"I asked him, basically, if they knew for sure that the suspect was in custody," Stanton said. "He wrote back and told me it was a stabbing and that they strongly suspected they have the person they're looking for."
 
Stanton said he received a text alert about 20 minutes after he'd become aware of the incident.
 
Although he said he was in class at the time of the incident, Stanton said "the VT alert didn't go out until after I got home."

Sophomores Lina Garada and Melissa Lawall said they were in the gym when a friend told them what happened. About a half hour later they received a text alert that confirmed the news.
 
"I still don't understand how it happened," Lawall said.
 
Garada, a Richmond native, said she's used to hearing news of violent acts in her home city, but wouldn't expect it in Blacksburg. She said it's unfortunate for such an incident to occur on students' second day back to class after winter break.
 
Graduate student James Allen received multiple text alerts about the incident while he was in Squires Student Center.
 
"Hate to say it, but unfortunately we've gotten used to this kind of thing after April 16, but it is sad though," Allen said.
 
On April 16, 2007, student Seung-Hui Cho shot and killed 32 students and faculty before turning a gun on himself.
 
Allen said all he can do now is trust that the school and university police have the situation under control, since the alert said that police had a suspect in custody.
 
-- Lerone Graham and Neil Harvey contributed to this report