The suspect in the rape and death of an Inha University female student walks out of the Incheon District Court after attending his arrest warrant hearing, July 17. Yonhap

Police investigating last week's rape and death of a university female student said Tuesday that she appeared to have been left unattended for over an hour after falling from a campus building where she was sexually assaulted by a male schoolmate.

The victim, a freshman at Inha University in Incheon, west of Seoul, was found lying naked and bleeding from her head, ears and mouth after her plunge from the third floor of a five-story campus building in the early hours of last Friday.

Emergency workers said she was breathing and had a pulse, though both were a little weak, after her discovery by a passerby but was pronounced dead at a hospital later.

The schoolmate, identified only as a 20-year-old first-year student of the same university, was apprehended as a suspect Friday afternoon, and a court issued an arrest warrant for him on charges of rape and manslaughter Sunday. He has acknowledged that the victim fell to her death but denied pushing her off the building, according to police.

Police believe the victim may have been left abandoned on the ground for longer than an hour after her plunge, saying she fell from the building between 1:30 a.m., when the suspect was seen on a CCTV camera supporting her on her way into the building, and 3:49 a.m., when she was discovered by a passerby.

The suspect reportedly drank with the victim just before her death but fled the scene after her fall from the building.

"It appears that the victim had been lying on the ground for a considerable amount of time before being discovered by a passerby," a police investigator said, adding she could have been saved if the suspect had immediately called an emergency rescue service instead of running away from the scene.

Police said they will consider changing part of the suspect's charges to include murder after further investigating whether he intentionally pushed her off the building. (Yonhap)