Suspect in Auburn stabbing arrested

BY ALAN RIQUELMY - ariquelmy@ledger-enquirer.com --

The suspect in the Wednesday stabbing of an Auburn man has turned himself in to authorities.

Johnathon Sepp Etterer, 20, of Birmingham, Ala. was charged with second-degree assault around 2 a.m. Thursday. Auburn police had been searching for Etterer after his roommate, Richard K. Straus, 20, was found stabbed at Edge Apartments on South College Street around 3:30 p.m., police said.

Straus, who was taken to the East Alabama Medical Center in Opelika, has been upgraded from critical to fair condition, police said.

"It appears that this incident was a dispute between roommates," police added.

The university put out an AU alert to its students at 2 p.m. Wednesday informing them of the stabbing and encouraging them to be cautious. The system is the university's emergency communications method that allows students, faculty and staff to receive time-sensitive emergency messages in the form of e-mail, voice and text messages.

Neither men are students at Auburn University, the college's Web site states.