Updates to our Terms of Use

We are updating our Terms of Use. Please carefully review the updated Terms before proceeding to our website.

Thursday, March 28, 2024 | Back issues
Courthouse News Service Courthouse News Service

UCLA Campus Shooter Compiled a ‘Kill List’

LOS ANGELES (CN) - Los Angeles police identified the man they say carried out a murder-suicide on the UCLA campus on Wednesday morning.

According to department spokeswoman Officer Jenny Houser, the gunman was 38-year-old Mainak Sarkar, a disgruntled doctoral student.

The authorities say Sarkar shot and killed his mentor, mechanical engineering professor William Klug, 39, before taking his own life.

The shooting triggered a massive police response and led to the Westwood campus being placed on lock down until it was determined no one else was involved in the shooting. Thousands of students barricaded themselves in rooms amid rumors of multiple shooters.

In a related development, the Los Angeles police said Thursday that a woman on a "kill list" found in Sarkar's home was found dead in Minnesota.

Andrew Neiman told KPCC public radio that authorities believe that Sarkar murdered the unidentified female victim before driving to Los Angeles to kill Klug.

"The belief is based on the evidence that he committed that murder, probably a day or so ago, and then drove out to the Los Angeles area to carry out this threat against professor Klug and presumably others," Neiman said.

He said that when police found Sarkar he had "quite a bit of ammunition" and two handguns. The incident on Wednesday "could have been far worse," he said.

"He had the capabilities to harm a lot more people based on the ammunition and weapons that he had in his possession," Neiman said.

Neiman said that as part of the criminal investigation, authorities had searched Sarkar's residence in Minnesota and found a list naming Klug, the female victim, and another UCLA professor, who was not harmed.

"We don't anticipate that he's in any danger," Neiman said.

According to reports, Sarkar had accused Klug in a blog post of stealing his computer code.

"William Klug, UCLA professor is not the kind of person when you think of a professor," Sarkar is reported to have written in a now-deleted March 10 blog post. "He is a very sick person. I urge every new student coming to UCLA to stay away from this guy. He made me really sick. Your enemy is my enemy. But your friend can do a lot more harm. Be careful about whom you trust."

"My name is Mainak Sarkar. I was this guy's Ph.D. student. We had personal differences. He cleverly stole all my code and gave it another student. He made me really sick," Sarkar wrote in the blog, titled "Long Dark Tunnel."

Neiman said that UCLA has discredited Sarkar's claims.

"UCLA is claiming that that is not accurate and not true," Neiman said. "At this point, it appears that Sarkar just had this in his mind and conjured it up. Whether he was suffering from some other type of mental illness, we don't know that for certain yet. But that is definitely a possibility."

He said that Minnesota authorities were continuing to investigate potential motives for the third killing. Authorities believe Sarkar lived in Minneapolis, Minnesota and possibly worked in different areas of the country.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Categories / Uncategorized

Subscribe to Closing Arguments

Sign up for new weekly newsletter Closing Arguments to get the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and hot cases and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world.

Loading...