A tragedy at the University of Alabama Huntsville

UPDATE (3:00pm): Police found a 9mm pistol in a bathroom on the 2nd floor of the Shelby Science Center last night.

UAH officials said Bishop, who has been an assistant professor at UAH since fall 2003, was up for tenure but said the faculty meeting had nothing to do with the tenure discussion. Huntsville police and the district attorney's office refused to discuss a possible motive. ("Police find gun used in UAH shooting in bathroom, more charges pending against Amy Bishop", Huntsville Times, 13 February 2010)

This is from the Boston Globe:

The University of Alabama biology professor accused of slaying three of her colleagues fatally shot her brother in an apparent accident in Massachusetts more than two decades ago, a local police chief said.

UPDATE (10:00am): Amy Bishop has been charged with murder.

On Friday afternoon at 4:00pm three biology faculty members at the University of Alabama Huntsville were killed by a shooter in a 3rd floor conference room of the Shelby Center. Two more members of the biology faculty and one staff member were wounded. The incident apparently occurred during a faculty meeting.

Although police have not confirmed the identity of the shooter, but news reports have identified her as Amy Bishop.¹According to the Huntsville Times, Dr. Bishop "is considered one of the University of Alabama in Huntsville's research stars."

The dead are:

• G. K. Podila, the department's chairman;
  
• Maria Ragland Davis
• Adriel D. Johnson Sr. 

The wounded are:

• Luis Rogelio Cruz-Vera
• Joseph G. Leahy
• Stephanie Monticciolo

You can find links to reports from the Huntsville Times here. Here's video from a news conference held at 9:00pm last night.

9 p.m. UAH briefing