Friday, June 3, 2016
Two people were killed in an alleged murder-suicide at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) campus on Wednesday. The shooting occurred on the fourth floor of the Engineering IV building. The university’s campus was in lockdown for about two hours after the shooting from 10:00AM to noon local time.
The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) have identified 39-year-old William S. Klug as the victim in the murder-suicide. He was an associate professor of the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. The shooting occurred in his office. According to the Police, the shooter was identified as Mainak Sarkar, a former student of the professor.
According to the Police, Mainak Sarkar had accused William S. Klug of stealing Sarkar’s computer code and turning it over to someone else. According to TheWrap, in March Mainak Sarkar had written in a blog post about William S. Klug, “We had personal differences. He cleverly stole all my code and gave it another student. He made me really sick. Your enemy is your enemy. But your friend can do a lot more harm. Be careful about whom you trust. Stay away from this sick guy”, and included a photo of the professor.
According to the LAPD, a note was found near scene and helped find the home address of the shooter and establish the fact of suicide.
During the lockdown students were asked to stay in a sheltered location, and those who moved around the campus were told to walk with their hands up and were searched by police officers. Classes were cancelled for the rest of the day. Final exams and graduation were to run as scheduled, and most classes were to resume as normal Thursday morning.
William S. Klug had been leading the Klug Research Group which specialised in theoretical and computational biomechanics. He was a father of two, a nine year old son in fourth grade and a seven year old daughter.