Purdue University student was stabbed and shot, prosecutor says

US - The Purdue University student killed Tuesday was shot and stabbed in a rampage that ended as quickly as it began with the suspect holding his bloody hands behind his head to await arrest, prosecutors said in a court filing on Thursday.

Cody Cousins, 23, is accused of killing Andrew Boldt, 21, of West Bend, Wisconsin in a basement classroom at the university in West Lafayette, Indiana. Both men were seniors in the College of Engineering at Purdue.

Cousins, of Warsaw, Indiana, was being held without bond at Tippecanoe County Jail and is expected to appear in court on Thursday afternoon.

Several students witnessed the attack in the classroom at the university's engineering building, the filing said. The violent episode marked the latest in a rash of gun attacks at schools across the United States.

Police found Cousins sitting on the ground outside the building with blood on his hands and clothes and his hands resting behind his head, Tippecanoe County Prosecuting Attorney Patrick Harrington said in the court filing.

Police found bloody footprints on the floor not far from Boldt's body and recovered a knife and a handgun and several spent shell casings, the court filing states. At least part of the incident was captured by a security video camera.

Authorities have not specified a motive for the attack, but have said the shooter seemed to target Boldt and no one else.

The shooting followed others at schools in Philadelphia, New Mexico and Georgia, intensifying the national debate over gun control.

On Monday night, a student was shot and critically wounded outside an athletic centre at Widener University in Chester, Pennsylvania, near Philadelphia.

Last week alone, two students were shot at a high school in Philadelphia, another was shot at a high school in Georgia, and two students were shot at a middle school in New Mexico.