BATON ROUGE, La. – A 22-year-old male has been charged with offering police false information during an investigation involving the slayings of two doctoral students at Louisiana State University (LSU).
According to police, Dallas Joseph Staden anonymously called police on Dec. 17 stating he had direct facts about the murders. He also gave several names as possible suspects, adding his name to the list.
Baton Rouge Police Department Sgt. Don Kelly said the police wasted valuable hours trying to verify Staden’s information.
On Dec. 21, Staden was arrested on an unrelated warrant; however, he remains in East Baton Rouge Parish prison where he has been charged with criminal mischief. Authorities are still pondering why Staden made the phone call.
Police are currently searching for at least three men – possibly four – in the murders of biology student Chandrasekhar Reddy Komma, 31, and chemistry student Kiran Kumar Allam, 33. The two students from India were each shot in the head in an apartment complex on the campus on Dec. 13.
Days following the killings, police issued sketches of two men who had been spotted in the apartment complex, as well as a description of an older model of a light-colored Oldsmobile thought to be the escape car. Kelly said the information is valid and came from other sources, not Staden’s phone call.
