A Black Ph.D. student has been arrested and charged with the second-degree murder of her ex-boyfriend.
Nijinsky Dix, 37, is accused of stalking and shooting 44-year-old Terry Hickman. The two had reportedly dated for three months, a stretch that ended in May.
In a press release, Washington D.C. Metropolitan Police detailed their response to a call reporting gunshots at an apartment complex in the District.
“Upon arrival, members located an adult male, inside an apartment suffering from gunshot wounds,” police stated, noting “the victim displayed no signs consistent with life.”
“The detectives’ investigation revealed this offense is domestic in nature,” their statement read.
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Chicago news station NBC 5 reported that Dix, who was completing her degree at the University of Illinois-Chicago, was found “kneeling at the victim’s feet with her right hand raised and her left hand between her legs. Officers noticed that the defendant was holding a handgun and asked to her drop the weapon, at which point she complied.”
Dix was reportedly on a call on speakerphone, and the other party identified herself as her mother.
“The individual stated the defendant called her and stated, ‘He pushed me, and I shot him,'” the court filings read.
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Dix was arrested and charged with second-degree murder while armed, possession of unregistered ammunition and possession of an unregistered firearm,
She was taken to a hospital, where a doctor conducted a health assessment. Medical personnel said Dix had an abrasion on the inside of her lip, and she told them she had back pain.
According to local reporting, when shown a photograph of Hickman, Dix began crying and repeating, “Get it away from me.”
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At one point, she then said, “You don’t do people you love like that, that’s not love, I don’t want that, he can’t do people like that, you don’t do people you love like that. I’m sorry.”
Dix was pursuing a doctorate and was the director of a TRiO program called Talent Search Upward Bound at Notre Dame, where she both worked and attended classes.
The university “is aware of her arrest,” officials there say, “and will cooperate with law enforcement as appropriate.”
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