By Gabrielle Tassone - February 15, 2010
The biology professor charged with opening fire at the University of Alabama Huntsville has ties to the Boston area. Following her alleged rampage at the university in which three faculty members were killed, new revelations show she allegedly killed her brother more than 23 years ago in Braintree, and was a suspect in an attempted mail bombing of a Harvard Medical School professor in 1993.
Authorities said on Saturday Bishop fatally shot her brother in 1986 in Braintree and was not charged after the shooting was deemed accidental.
According to the Boston Globe, Braintree Police Chief Paul H. Frazier said Bishop killed her brother with a shotgun following an argument, and fired two other rounds inside the house before fleeing.
Prosecutors didn't bring charges after her mother, Judy Bishop, insisted the shooting was accidental.
Braintree police said the file on the 1986 case went missing shortly after the shooting. Mayor Joseph Sullivan said the town is investigating the lost report.
"The Braintree Police Department will conduct a thorough audit of all its records to identify if there were deficits in its past record-keeping process," Sullivan said in a prepared statement.
The police also said on Saturday they were considering reopening the case.
On Sunday, a Boston law enforcement official said Bishop and her husband, James Andersen, were questioned in the attempted mail bombing of a Harvard professor.
Two pipe bombs were mailed to the Newton home of Dr. Paul Rosenberg in 1993, but did not go off and no one was charged. At the time of the incident, Bishop was set to receive a negative evaulation from Rosenberg, then a Harvard Medical School professor and physician at Children's Hospital Boston. Bishop was working as a postdoctoral fellow in the hospital's human biochemistry lab, according to the Globe.
The law enforcement official said it was concluded that the evidence was circumstantial and not sufficient enough to warrant charges.
Rosenberg declined to give comment to the Globe.
Sylvia Fluckiger told the Globe in a telephone interview yesterday that Bishop had a dispute with Rosenberg before the bombs were mailed.
"We knew she had a beef with Paul Rosenberg," Fluckiger said. "And we really thought it was a really unbelievable conincidence that he would get those bombs."
Bishop had been working at the University of Alabama since 2003, and had recently been denied tenure. Authorities haven't discussed the possible motives or whether the issue of tenure may have played a role in the shooting.
Bishop was arrested as she left the university's sciences building on Friday. Rob Broussard, Madison county district attorney, said officials were considering other charges, including attempted murder for the shooting and injuring of three other professors.
According to CNN, authorities have not ruled out the possibility of other suspects in connection to the shooting.
