She remembered Pring-Wilson telling the class that he couldn’t watch coverage of the war in Iraq.

“He said ‘It’s so tragic, I hate violence so much.’ I felt immediately it was very genuine,” Pokrovsky said. “I felt as if this person could be a natural pacifist.”

‘There Are No Winners’

Despite remarks by Marcos Colono, quoted in yesterday’s Boston Herald, that Pring-Wilson is a “Harvard thug,” there were no signs yesterday that the stabbing was going to fuel local anti-Harvard sentiments.

Cambridge Mayor Michael A. Sullivan expressed his sympathy for the victim’s family, but cautioned that anger should not be directed at Harvard or the Harvard student body.

“As Michael’s brother said, even people at Harvard do stupid things. They need to face the consequences,” Sullivan said. “But I don’t think it’s fair to paint the student body in the same breath as the gentleman who is charged with the crime,”

Sullivan said Harvard students and Cambridge residents have occasional tensions—but said they “are few and far between.”

“You have to be careful to separate out issues as they relate to the University from the student population of the University,” he said.

Sullivan said he foresaw difficult times for the family of both the victim and Pring-Wilson. “There are no winners,” he said.

—Jenifer L. Steinhardt contributed to the reporting of this story.

—Staff writer Hana R. Alberts can be reached at alberts@fas.harvard.edu.