*Trigger Warning: this true crime story involves heavy themes of mental health and suicide*
On May 28th, 1995 students were preparing to enjoy their last day of the spring semester at the prestigious Ivy League school of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. However, to the shock and horror of everyone on the campus and surrounding areas, early that Sunday morning two female student’s bodies were found deceased in their dorm room at the Dunster House residence hall on campus.
These two female victims were 20 year old pre-med students Trang Phuong Ho and her roommate Sinedu Tadesse. These young women had lived together in this dorm room for the past two years, and from the outside looking in they appeared to be close friends.
However, as police began looking closer into these deaths, they began to piece together what really happened that fateful Sunday morning. As it turned out, this friendship appeared to have come to a violent end in a murder-suicide that shocked the Harvard community.
Trang Phuong Ho was a 20 year old woman who had moved to the United States with her father at the age of 10 years old. Her family was originally from South Vietnam but fled to seek refuge in the United States after North Vietnam took over.
Trang’s journey with her father to the United States was anything but easy. Before they fled the country, her father had to cut her hair so that she would look like a boy and they would allow her flee. They fled on a boat that was so packed with people they had to stand for seven days and they were attacked by pirates during their trip.
They eventually reached a refugee camp in Indonesia where they stayed for a year and were taught English so they could integrate better into society when they did finally arrive in America.
After the long and hard journey of fleeing Vietnam, her and her father finally made it to San Diego where they settled into American life.
At the age of 18, during her senior year of high school, Trang’s mother and sister were finally able to leave Vietnam and meet her and her father in the United States. It was at this time that the family decided to move to Massachusetts because they knew there would be better educational opportunities in that area for Trang.
Trang was very smart from a young age. When she arrived in the United States, this was no different. If anything Trang worked even harder when it came to her studies because she desperately wanted to succeed and make her family proud.
She was considered an exceptional student being the valedictorian of her senior class in 1992. She was also only one of two students admitted to Harvard University that year that received a perfect score from the admissions committee and she received a full financial scholarship.
Trang was even mentioned in the Boston Magazine as being one of 25 people that were going to change Boston for the better one day. Everyone was looking at her and she was considered to be the hope of the next generation at this time.
She began attending Harvard University in the Fall of 1992 where she was enrolled as a biology major planning to pursue pre-med. When college began for her, Trang was described by everyone around her as being energetic, optimistic, and always willing to help others.
While going to college, her parents began going through a tough separation which took a toll on Trang emotionally. Her father moved back to San Diego, and being the oldest daughter meant that she now had to take on more responsibilities as the head of household even being away at university.
Trang would take the short bus ride home every weekend to be with her mother and sister and help with anything they needed. She was also working two jobs at this time to help support her family financially.
Although Trang had a lot going on at this point in her life, the people around her said they would’ve never known. Despite everything, she always remained her happy and energetic self.
Sinedu Tadesse was a 20 year old woman that was born into a wealthy family in Ethiopia. She moved to the United States in 1992 when she began attending Harvard University.
From a very young age, just like Trang, Sinedu was very smart and she focused a lot of her time and effort on school and her grades. She had said that she worked so hard in school because she wanted the opportunity to get out of Ethiopia and obtain a good education.
In high school, Sinedu was one of six students chosen to attend an International Community High School because of her academic excellence. From this high school she graduated as valedictorian of her senior class.
After graduating from high school, Sinedu was also rewarded a full scholarship to Harvard University where she also began attending classes in Fall of 1992. She was also a biology student pursuing pre-med and she said that she wanted to become a doctor to one day return to Ethiopia and help people in the way that doctors in the country didn’t know how.
However, after she began attending Harvard, Sinedu began struggling in school which was something she wasn’t ever used to before. Her grades were still relatively good, but she knew that if she wanted to get into medical school one day then she needed to start bringing her grades back up.
Sinedu was also struggling a lot while attending college not only with grades, but also not being close to her family and having that encouragement she felt like she needed. Her family was still back in Ethiopia at this time and she began to feel very isolated from her peers.
Soon after college began, Sinedu began attending therapy through Harvard because of how isolated and alone she was feeling. People around Sinedu described her as being a loner, not having a compelling personality, and they also said that she never really made eye contact with anyone around her.
Because of the loneliness she was expeiriencing at this time, Sinedu began writing letters to fellow students by picking them out of a phonebook and basically asking them if they wanted to be friends with her.
These letters were never responded to by other students, but one was sent to the Dean by one student, yet they filed the letter away in a cabinet.
Sinedu also kept a journal that she titled “My Book of Social Rules” where she would talk about herself and how she was bad at making friends. In this journal she would give herself assignments on how to make more friends and socially interact with others.
When Sinedu and Trang met and began living together their sophomore year of college, Sinedu was extremely excited. She called her parents back home and told them about how she was so happy to finally have a best friend. When they moved in together Sinedu became a lot happier and she began feeling like Trang was the only person she had in her life.
In the Spring of 1995, Trang Phuong Ho and Sinedu Tadesse were in their junior year at Harvard University. They had both been living on campus in the Dunster House residence hall.
Trang and Sinedu began living together at the beginning of their sophomore year at Harvard after meeting in science class the year prior. The two met and immediately found similarities with each other. Both women had been aspiring doctors, and both of them were from different countries and then came to the United States seeking more opportunities.
Like mentioned previously, these two girls were not only seen by others as roommates, but very close friends. However, as we know, this friendship eventually ended in one of the most horrific ways possible.
Trang had finished her final exams on Saturday May 27th, 1995 and she was looking forward to the upcoming summer break. That weekend Trang’s best friend, a 26 year old woman named Thao Nguyen, was also staying with her in her residence hall to help her pack and prepare to move back home.
That Saturday night, Trang and Thao went to a friends house to celebrate Trang finishing the semester of school and they returned back to her dorm room at around 2 a.m. and fell asleep in her bed together.
At around 8 a.m. that Sunday morning on May 28th, 1995, Thao was awoken by some noise coming from Trang sleeping next to her in the bed. When she woke up, she saw Sinedu standing over Trang with a hunting knife and she was stabbing her repeatedly.
Thao said Sinedu had a glazed look in her eyes, was completely silent, and had a blank expression on her face as she was stabbing Trang. Trang was desperately trying to fight Sinedu off of her and Thao began trying to fight back as well, but when she did Sinedu turned towards her and began trying to attack her.
Thao managed to get off of the bed and run towards the door of the room and escape, however; the door automatically locked from the outside when closed so she couldn’t get back into the room to help Trang that was still inside.
At this point Thao decided to run up to a student she saw eating breakfast, and she had blood all over her hands and she asked them to call the police. When the police arrived they managed to gain entry to the dorm room using force.
When they entered the room, they found the dead body of Trang Phuong Ho still laying in her bed. Trang had been stabbed 45 times with a knife.
When the police entered the bathroom inside the dorm room, they also found the dead body of Sinedu Tadesse hanging from a rope that was attached to the shower. It was immediately clear to police from the crime scene and Thao’s witness statement that Sinedu had killed her roommate that morning before taking her own life immediately after.
With a further investigation into the crime, the police actually found a journal entry written by Sinedu that actually showed that this murder-suicide was premeditated. This journal entry said:
“On the way to depression and battered with pessimistic thoughts, I am unlovable and a cuckoo. Trang told me I am boring, I felt like I am boring her. If I ever grow desperate enough to seek power in a fearful respect through killing, she would be the first one I would blow off. You know what annoys me the most, that situations would never reverse for me to be the strong and her to be the weak. She’ll live on tucked in the warmth and support of her family while I cry alone in the cold. The bad way out I see is suicide and the good way out is killing. Savoring their fear and then suicide but you know what annoys me the most? I do nothing.”
This journal entry proved even further to investigators that Sinedu had killed her roommate and supposed best friend.
In the weeks leading up to the murder-suicide, Sinedu became very needy towards Trang and wanted her constant attention. However, Trang actually told her that she was moving out next year and living with other friends which meant that Sinedu would have to find another roommate.
Sinedu was extremely upset by the idea of Trang moving out. She felt like this meant Trang wasn’t going to be her friend anymore, and she was the only one she had. Sinedu was extremely depressed at this time and Trang was essentially the only thing she had left, and she felt like she was about to be taken away from her also.
Just a week before the murder-suicide happened, the police found a picture of Sinedu along with a note in the trash at the Harvard Crimson Newspaper. This note told the newspaper to keep the picture stating that their would be a “juicy story” involving this woman soon. Despite this alarming note, the newspaper threw it out and didn’t contact the police.
After the murder-suicide occurred, the newspaper used this same picture when they posted the story.
This case has been discussed in the media a lot over the years. Many people believe that Sinedu had to have had deeper mental health issues going on for her to commit an act of this nature. Regardless of her possible mental health issues though, this doesn’t make the murder she committed any less tragic and heinous.
Following this case, two more students at Harvard University committed suicide that same year in 1995. This prompted a lot of media attention on the pressures on students at Harvard and blaming the school for not having more measures and resources in place to prevent tragedies like this from occurring.
After this tragedy and the negative media attention Harvard University was receiving, they did put in place more mental health resources for students and try to advertise these more around campus. However, even today in 2023 students that attend the school still criticize the schools mental health programs and don’t feel like enough progress has been made.
A Trang Phuong Ho scholarship at Harvard University was set up following the tragedy and is still in place today. A Harvard alumni, Melanie Thernstrom, also wrote a book in 1998 titled Halfway Heaven: Diary of a Harvard Murder that discusses the tragedy that occurred and how she believes the school has more of a responsibility than they will ever admit to.
Sources:
How a Dorm Room Murder Occurred at Harvard. (2020). YouTube.