Police arrest man in connection with university dorm fire

BOWLING GREEN, Ky. -- Police arrested a man Sunday in connection with a dormitory fire that killed an 18-year-old student, found a week ago with stab wounds in her burning room at Western Kentucky University.

Lucas Goodrum, 21, of Scottsville, Ky., was charged with murder in the death of freshman Katie Autry, university police chief Bob Deane said Sunday.

"We made the arrest based on information we received during the course of our investigation," Deane said.

He said Goodrum was not a student at the university, but he refused to comment on any other details, including what Goodrum's relationship to Autry may have been and what led to his arrest.

Goodrum was being held Sunday on $1 million cash bond. A man who answered the telephone at his father's Scottsville home wouldn't comment.

The arrest came a week after firefighters pulled Autry from a fire in her second-floor dorm room around 4 a.m. Along with third-degree burns, she had puncture wounds and abrasions to her face and neck, authorities said. She died four days later.

"I hope that they have the right person," Autry's aunt, Virginia White, said Sunday. "We still won't be satisfied until this person gets what's coming to them."

No other students were injured in the May 4 fire, which was confined to Autry's room. Her roommate was away at the time, and only about 50 of the 310 residents were in the building.

"As the investigation continues, we'll learn how he got into Katie's room," said university president Gary Ransdell. "We don't know at this point what took place behind the locked doors."

Western Kentucky's campus police department has said little about the investigation, which it has led.

Throughout the week, more than 100 students were interviewed, including members of a campus fraternity, where friends said Autry had attended a party the night before the fire.

Friends and family members planned a memorial service for Autry on Sunday in Pellville, Ky., her hometown.