US man charged with murder of British student

A US man charged with the abduction of a British-born student has now been indicted on a count of first-degree murder over her death.

University of Virginia student Hannah Graham, 18, disappeared in September and was found dead in Albemarle County a few weeks later.

Jesse Matthew Jr, 33, had already been charged with abduction with intent to defile in the case and has now been indicted on the murder charge, prosecutor Denise Lunsford said.

He also faces two counts of reckless driving in the case.

Police say forensic evidence also links Matthew to the 2009 disappearance and death of 20-year-old Virginia Tech student Morgan Harrington, whose body was also found in the county. Ms Lunsford says no charges have been filed against Matthew in that case.

She added that Matthew’s first court appearance is scheduled for February 18.

Ms Lunsford declined to say why Matthew was not charged with the higher count of capital murder. The abduction and first-degree murder charges are punishable by up to life in prison.

Ms Graham vanished after a night out with friends on September 12. According to police, she left an off-campus party alone and texted a friend saying she was lost.

In surveillance video, she can be seen walking unsteadily and even running at times, past a pub and a service station and then on to a seven-block strip of bars, restaurants and shops. Another video captured her leaving a restaurant with Matthew, who had an arm around her.

Her disappearance prompted a month-long search involving thousands of volunteers as well as police. It ended when searchers found her remains on October 18 in rural Albemarle County, about six miles from the hayfield where Ms Harrington’s body was found in January 2010.

Ms Harrington disappeared while attending a Metallica concert at the University of Virginia in October 2009. Her T-shirt was later found on a nearby tree limb.

After police named Matthew a person of interest in Ms Graham’s disappearance, he fled and was later apprehended on a beach in Texas. He was charged with abduction with intent to defile, a felony that empowered police to swab his cheek for a DNA sample. That sample connected Matthew to a 2005 sexual assault in Fairfax County, Virginia, according to authorities. He has pleaded not guilty in that case.

The DNA evidence in the Fairfax sexual assault, in turn, linked Matthew to the Harrington case.

Matthew had previously been accused of raping students at Liberty University and Christopher Newport University in 2002 and 2003. The cases were dropped after the women declined to press charges.