Injured Kiwi under guard after wife found murdered

A New Zealand postgraduate student at Cornell University in New York is a suspect in the gory murder of his wife, a researcher at the university.

Blazej Kot, 24, was taken into custody on Wednesday (NZ time) after a policeman on routine patrol noticed his car in a closed parking area and found him covered in blood.

Kot drove off and led police on a 8km chase before crashing into a stand of trees. He was found with an apparent self-inflicted injury and police said they had to forcibly take an "edged" weapon from him.

Kot was airlifted to a local hospital, where he was in a stable condition and under guard after surgery.

Police went to Kot's apartment and found a fire had been set inside, which was put out in about 15 minutes.

Two hikers found Kot's wife, Dr Caroline Coffey, 28, dead with a large cut in her neck on Thursday.

She was on a track that runs through Taughannock Falls State Park, and had bled to death.

The walking track is 120m from the couple's home.

Police said they were treating the death as a homicide and Kot as a suspect.

Kot has said that he graduated from Auckland University in 2005. He was born in Zaire, to Polish parents, and lived half his life in New Zealand.

American police described him as a "New Zealand native".

The couple married late last year, after Dr Coffey completed her own PhD in biomedical science.

She was from Pennsylvania, but her website said she was born in Ireland. She was working at the university as a post-doctoral researcher.

- NZPA