Woman on UCLA shooter's 'kill list' found dead in Brooklyn Park

Updated: 5:38 p.m. | Posted: 11:03 a.m.

The man who carried out a murder-suicide at UCLA left a "kill list" at his Minnesota home that led authorities to find a woman's body, Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck said Thursday.

Mainak Sarkar, 38, drove to Los Angeles from Minnesota and killed Professor Bill Klug before taking his own life Wednesday, Beck said. When authorities searched Sarkar's St. Paul home, they found a "kill list" with the names of Klug, another UCLA professor and a woman.

The woman has not yet been identified, but records show that Sarkar had been married to 31-year-old Ashley Hasti, who is listed as living in the home the authorities searched Thursday morning. Hasti is also listed as being a medical student at the University of Minnesota, dating back to 2012.

Sarkar was heavily armed with two semiautomatic pistols and multiple ammunition magazines when he came to campus looking for both professors, Beck told reporters.

Authorities believe the guns were legally purchased and at least one was registered to Sarkar. The evidence shows that he killed himself immediately after shooting Klug, Beck said.

The note Sarkar left at the Klug scene asked that someone check on his cat in St. Paul, the chief added.

Officials are still trying to piece together Sarkar's trip across the country to see if he committed other crimes on the way, he added.

The woman was found shot dead in her home in Brooklyn Park. The other professor on the list is OK.

Brooklyn Park police say they conducted a welfare check at a home on the 2400 block of Pearson Parkway around 12:35 a.m. at the request of Los Angeles police. Upon arrival, officers found the woman dead from an apparent gunshot wound, Deputy Chief Mark Bruley said in a statement.

"Early indications are the shooting occurred prior to the UCLA event," Bruley said.

Beck said it appeared mental issues were involved and that Sarkar's dispute with Klug was tied to Sarkar thinking the professor released intellectual property that harmed Sarkar.

Police asked for the public's help to find the car Sarkar drove to Los Angeles, a 2003 Nissan Sentra with the license plate 720KTW.

Sarkar is listed on a UCLA website as a member of a computational biomechanics research group run by Klug, a professor of mechanical engineering.

Classes at the University of California, Los Angeles campus resumed Thursday for most of the school, except for the engineering department, whose students and faculty will return Monday.

Klug was a devoted family man and a superb teacher, said a collaborator, UCLA professor Alan Garfinkel. The two worked together to build a computer model of the heart, a "50 million variable 'virtual heart' that could be used to test drugs."

"Bill was an absolutely wonderful man, just the nicest guy you would ever want to meet," Garfinkel said.

Initial reports from the scene set off widespread fears of an attempted mass shooting on campus, bringing a response of hundreds of heavily armed officers. Groups of them stormed into buildings that were locked down and cleared hallways as police helicopters hovered overhead.

Advised by university text alerts to turn off lights and lock the doors where they were, many students let friends and family know they were safe in social media posts. Some described frantic evacuation scenes, while others wrote that their doors weren't locking and posted photos of photocopiers and foosball tables they used as barricades.

After about two hours, Beck said it was a murder-suicide and declared the threat over. Two men were dead, and authorities found a gun and a note, he said.

It was the week before final exams at UCLA, whose 43,000 students make it the largest campus in the University of California system.

UCLA's commencement ceremonies and end-of-year events will now include mourning Klug, who was a devout Christian and a regular figure in organizing campus spiritual life.

Peter Gianusso, who headed the El Segundo Little League where Klug coached, said he "exemplified what Little League was all about: character, courage and loyalty."