Teen Questioned in Killing of Tessa Majors, 18, Barnard Student

A teenage boy was taken into custody on Friday in connection with the killing of Tessa Majors, an 18-year-old Barnard student who was fatally stabbed while walking through a park near her campus, a law enforcement official said.

Investigators believe that the boy was part of a group that attacked Ms. Majors on Wednesday night as she was walking through Morningside Park, the official said.

The police were not sure what role the teenager played in the stabbing and have yet to charge him with a crime, the official said.

Detectives were also looking at other people who may have been involved, according to the official.

The killing of Ms. Majors, a first-year college student from Virginia who was interested in journalism and played in a rock band, rattled university students and other city residents.

Ms. Majors was walking in the park when she was approached by one to three people near West 116th Street and Morningside Drive, said Rodney Harrison, the Police Department’s chief of detectives, on Thursday.

There was a struggle, and one of the assailants pulled out a knife and stabbed Ms. Majors several times, Chief Harrison said. The attackers then fled, and Ms. Majors staggered up a flight of stairs, out of the park and onto the street, where a campus security guard found her.

Ms. Majors was taken to Mount Sinai St. Luke’s hospital, where she died from her injuries, Chief Harrison said.

The park where Ms. Majors was stabbed is in a precinct in Harlem that has grown safer over the years, with major crimes declining dramatically there over the last 20 years, according to police data.

But residents have raised concerns about persistent crime in Morningside Park, even as the neighborhood around it improved, and playgrounds and ball fields replaced patches that were once strewn with crack vials.

Earlier this year, several people reported that they had been approached from behind in the park and punched by young people.

As of Dec. 8, there had been 20 robberies inside Morningside Park or on its perimeter this year, compared to seven in the same period last year.

Since June, five people have reported being robbed on or near the staircase at 116th Street and Morningside Drive, near the location where Ms. Majors was stabbed. Recently, the police said, several teenagers had been arrested in a pattern of robberies in the area.

Ashley Southall and Azi Paybarah contributed reporting.