Elaprolu Jayachandra

Hyderabad, Dec. 26: A computer science student from Andhra Pradesh was shot dead in a Christmas morning robbery at a Texas gas station store where he worked part time as a clerk.

Elaprolu Jayachandra, who was doing his MS at the University of Houston, was the 19th student from the state to have been killed abroad in the past three years. Andhra protocol officials said most of the killings had been for gain.

Houston police spokesperson Brad Corbett said today investigators were surprised by the ferocity of the masked gunman who shot the student five times before escaping with the cash box.

Jayachandra ducked behind a door that led to a small office behind the counter, but was shot through the door, CCTV footage revealed.

The 22-year-old software engineer was filling in for a colleague who had taken the day off for Christmas. Ali Khan, a manager at the store, said Jayachandra had been working there for less than a month.

In Jayachandra’s home in Vijayawada, his maternal uncle Shekhar said a university associate broke the news to the family late last evening.

Jayachandra’s grieving father Nageswar Rao, said he had spoken to his son hours before the murder.

“When told about the chilly weather in Vijayawada this season, my son said the weather was very bad in Texas and after evening, there were hardly any people on the roads,” the 56-year-old said.

Rao said the family was expecting Jayachandra back in a year and had fixed his marriage with a local girl.

Last evening, Komati Jayaram, who heads the Telugu Association of North America, visited Jayachandra’s house to console his parents. He said the association would make arrangements to bring the body to India.

Corbett said the gunman in a ski mask appeared to have walked in with a 9mm semiautomatic pistol and started shooting indiscriminately.

“He’s a very violent individual, and the sooner we apprehend him, the better,” PTI quoted the officer as saying.A woman who entered the store about a minute-and-a-half after the incident found Jayachandra slumped on the ground and called the police.