Julia Kathleen Pryde, a 23-year-old female graduate student at Virginia Tech, died on April 16, 2007, in Blacksburg, Virginia. She was from Middletown, New Jersey, and was pursuing a master's degree in Biological Systems Engineering. Julia was in her Advanced Hydrology class in Norris Hall when she was killed.
The person responsible for her death was Seung-Hui Cho, a 23-year-old student at Virginia Tech.
Cho armed himself with two pistols and carried out a shooting rampage on the campus in two separate attacks. In total, he killed 32 students and faculty members and wounded 17 others before taking his own life. Therefore, there was no arrest or trial for a suspect in her death.
Following the massacre, Julia's parents, Karen and Harry Pryde, filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Virginia Tech. The lawsuit alleged that the university was negligent by failing to warn students in a timely manner after the initial shootings occurred in a dormitory. The Prydes argued that their daughter might have survived if an earlier alert had been issued. A jury initially returned a verdict in favor of the Prydes, but the Virginia Supreme Court later overturned it, ruling that the university did not have a duty to warn students in that specific situation and could not have anticipated the extent of Cho's actions. The Prydes were one of only two families who did not join an $11 million settlement with the state.
