SUNY Potsdam student Elizabeth “Beth” Howell was struck by three bullets fired from a car and ran a short distance before collapsing, witnesses told police of the mysterious murder.
Howell, 21, was walking just off campus when three shots were fired during the drive-by shooting at around 5:45 p.m. on Friday, according to the Potsdam Police Department.
Responding officers found the music education student unresponsive on the side of the road at the corner of College Park Road and East Drive, the statement said. Authorities administered life-saving measures at the scene, but the Patterson, NY native was later pronounced dead at Canton Potsdam Hospital, police said.
Cops later arrested Michael J. Snow, 31, for the murder but are asking the public’s help in getting information about his gray Honda Civic that was caught on surveillance footage in the area.
It remains unclear if Snow and Howell knew each other, but the school said the alleged shooter had any affiliation with the school “either as a student, employee or graduate.”
But a college spokesperson told Syracuse.com on Tuesday that Snow’s uncle works at the college and his mother is an alumna.
State Department of Environmental police were searching for the gun used in the killing along the St. Regis River on State Highway 11B, WWNY-TV reported.
Snow, who was arrested Saturday at his home in Massena, is now being held at the St. Lawrence Correctional Facility without bail.
Police said he drove his Honda in a 90-mile arc Friday night crossing through Potsdam, Hopkinton, Malone, Westville, Hogansburg and Messina from 5 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Potsdam is about 30 miles from the US border with Canada.
Potsdam police are asking residents in the area to review home or business surveillance footage “for evidence of Snow or his vehicle in the area in the hour leading up to the shooting.”
Howell, who played in the school’s Crane Symphony Orchestra, was set to graduate this year. Her parents told The Post in an emotional interview that they believed their daughter was in the “wrong place [at the wrong time.”
“She was the type of person that didn’t have enemies, and certainly no one that would want to kill her,” grieving dad Joe Howell said in an interview at the family’s home in Putnam County.
