The man accused of attacking a Georgia Tech researcher with a sword last week previously scuffled with the victim about a woman.
Five months ago at a dance on campus, Kshitij Shrotri, the alleged attacker, became incensed when he saw a woman he liked dancing alongside Samer Tawfik.
Shrotri yelled in a foreign language and then pushed Tawfik several times, according to a Georgia Tech police report. "He said that he was yelling at his friends for not keeping Tawfik away" from the woman, a Tech officer wrote later, after interviewing Shrotri about the incident.
The woman, whom the AJC is not identifying, considered filing a protection order against Shrotri, but decided that would only aggravate him. Police and the Tech dean's office asked Shrotri to stay away from her, and he agreed, says the police report, obtained by the AJC with the Georgia Open Records Act.
That report last September notes that Shrotri, who earned a Ph.D. from Tech in 2008, had moved to Delaware.
But he returned to the Tech campus Thursday and allegedly attacked Tawfik with what one policeman described as a katana, a single-edged sword like those used by warriors in medieval Japan.
It was a gruesome scene.
Officers who were called to an office at the Weber Space Science and Technology Building that afternoon described seeing books, papers and shelving scattered on the floor. A wounded Tawfik lay on his back with a bloodied arm thrust in the air as if to defend himself, and Shrotri stood over him gripping the sword.
"He ruined my life," one officer heard Shrotri say. By that point, several officers had their handguns trained on Shrotri and were ordering him to drop the sword, according to another report also obtained by the AJC.
"You will have to kill me," Shrotri responded.
A scuffle ensued after one of the officers squirted pepper spray at Shrotri. Officer Robert J. Turner, 29, of Griffin, had his right hand cut as he tackled Shrotri.
Officers wrote in their reports that Tawfik was cut on the hands, wrists and torso. One officer observed a "long open wound" on his left side. Tawfik was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital where surgeons operated on him. He was still there Tuesday in stable condition.
Both Tawfik and Shrotri had a history at Tech's School of Aerospace Engineering. Tawfik, 39, is a post-doctoral research fellow there, and that is where Shrotri, 32, earned his Ph.D.
Shrotri was charged with aggravated assault and battery. He waived a first-appearance hearing Friday and is scheduled for a preliminary hearing later this month in Fulton County Superior Court.
Authorities have provided no motive for the sword attack, and the recent police report does not link it to Shrotri's outburst at the Turkish Student Organization dance last September.
Tawfik's account of that incident has Shrotri yelling at the woman: "I told you not to do this," as the dancers dispersed, heading for their seats. Tawfik told police that Shrotri initially refused to leave the event but finally did after pushing Tawfik. He told police that he believed Shrotri had an "obsession" with the woman, the September police report says. Tawfik told an officer that he didn't want to file charges against Shrotri but that he did want to ensure the incident was noted.
The woman told campus police in September that she'd known Shrotri since 2005 and that he'd been e-mailing her. But, the police report says she "really does not know him on a personal level."
An officer wrote that he told Shrotri to stay away from her under threat of a criminal trespass warning. The case was closed after Shrotri, who told the officer that he had romantic feelings for the woman, agreed to leave her alone.
"He stated that he understood," the officer wrote in the September report.
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