Chris Stevens' Death: University Of California Hastings College Of The Law, Roommate Mourn Diplomat Killed In Libya

University of California Hastings College of the Law is mourning their alumnus, Libyan ambassador Chris Stevens, after he died from "severe asphyxiation" when gunman and others set fire to the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi. Stevens was 52 years old.

Former professors and colleagues remember a "bright" student who always wanted to join the Foreign Service.

"This is a tragedy. We mourn this loss." the dean of the law school, Frank H. Wu, said in a statement.

The AP has more:

Ambassador Chris Stevens, 52, died as he and a group of embassy employees went to the consulate to try to evacuate staff as a crowd of hundreds attacked the consulate Tuesday evening, many of them firing machine-guns and rocket-propelled grenades.

By the end of the assault, much of the building was burned out and trashed. Stevens was the first U.S. ambassador to be killed in the line of duty since 1979.

"He was one of the smartest men I knew, and one of the least judgmental," Austin Tichenor, his college roommate at UC Berkeley, told the Reporter. "He could always see the other guy's point of view. It's what made him such a perfect diplomat."