Man accused in Chinese student’s death says he was in her room before she died

TORONTO – A man accused of killing a York University student from China says he was briefly in her room the night before she was found dead and calls her friendly and outgoing.

Qian Liu, 23, was found dead April 15, 2011 in her off-campus basement apartment, mostly naked and face down on the floor.

Brian Dickson, who was a tenant in the same building, has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder, but his lawyer has told the jury he’ll be urging a finding of manslaughter.

The jury is watching a video of a 3 1/2-hour police interview, in which Dickson says he met Liu for the first time a month prior and though her English was not perfect, he could tell she was “a very sweet person.”

He tells Toronto police Det.-Sgt. Frank Skubic in the interview that he was briefly in her room on that occasion and again the night before she was found dead, when they talked about cooking.

The jury has heard that Liu was chatting with her boyfriend in China through a webcam when he saw someone force his way into Liu’s room around 1 a.m.

Dickson says in the interview that he chatted with Liu around 10 p.m. then he left the building to go to an on-campus restaurant, where he stayed until about 12:20 a.m.

He says he took a sleeping pill around 11:40 p.m. so that he could fall asleep soon after he got home, which he says was about 12:30 a.m. He went down to the basement to get his clothes from the laundry, he says.