Update, 5:34 pm: More details continue to emerge in the case. According to information released by UC Berkeley at 5:23 pm, UCPD Captain Margo Bennett said that four officers, not three as previously reported, entered the school’s computer lab where the suspect Christopher Travis had gone on Tuesday. Nine people were in the room at the time, in addition to Travis, she said. The Alameda County coroner’s office conducted an autopsy this morning on Travis and a report will be released at a later time. Since the shooting, at least 20 witnesses have been interviewed, she said, and video surveillance footage has been reviewed. The Associated Press reports that Bill Travis, the suspect’s father, sobbed during a brief telephone interview with from his home in Lodi. He said he learned his son had been shot Tuesday night and didn’t want to make any further comment.
Update, 3:46 pm: New details have been revealed about the shooting, including the fact that Travis sustained multiple gunshot wounds during the confrontation with police officers. He was carrying a loaded Ruger semi-automatic 9 mm handgun, which was registered in his name in San Jose, according to UCPD Capt. Margo Bennett who spoke to the media Wednesday afternoon, according to the Daily Californian.
Bennett said when police entered the Haas computer lab, Travis looked up, saw police officers and pointed his gun at them. Nine other people were present in the room at the time, three of whom were “in the line of fire,” Bennett said. After telling Travis multiple times to lower his weapon, one officer shot Travis.
University spokesman Dan Mogulof told Berkeleyside that police review of the video in the computer lab “appears to corroborate all the accounts” of the incident, including the multiple warnings to the suspect and that he was pointing his gun at the police. Mogulof also said that there had been reports that the suspect’s behavior “had changed” in recent weeks. Police officers informed Travis’ family in Lodi of his death last night, Mogulof said.
Update, 2:48 pm: More information about Chris Travis, the 32-year-old Cal transfer student who died yesterday after being shot by a police officer on campus, has emerged. In a video produced by Allied Barton, the security services company where Travis formerly worked as a shift supervisor, a narrator describes Travis as having had a difficult childhood. The narrator says: “Imagine growing up with no direction, disappointing your parents, taking pills to take your own life, dropping out of school…”. Travis made a successful career for himself over three years at Allied Barton and then went back to school, first at Ohlone College in Fremont, then as an undergraduate business major at Cal. Travis volunteered at VITA, an organization that provides free income tax preparation assistance, and, according to the video, had aspirations to do an internship at the United Nations and develop a career in international business.
Update 12:50 pm: Christopher Travis, the man who died after being shot by UC Police at the Haas School yesterday, worked as a security guard for Allied Barton for five years until June this year, according to his LinkedIn profile. He listed his role as “supervisor” for security services at a biotech group.
Update 11:23 am: The dead gunman has been identified as 32-year old Christopher Nathen Elliot Travis. He transferred to the university this fall. He had attended Ohlone College, based in Fremont, where he graduated in June.
Update 9:52 am: University spokesman Dan Mogulof confirmed to Berkeleyside that the suspect died yesterday afternoon at Highland Hospital. The still-unidentified man was an undergraduate transfer student in his 30s and a business major, according to Mogulof.
Mogulof said that over 20 witnesses were being interviewed by police and the witnesses had been corroborating the original account of the story, detailed yesterday.
“There is no suggestion that this is anything other than an isolated incident,” Mogulof said.
Original story: The gunman who was shot by UC Police yesterday afternoon at the Haas School of Business has died at Highland Hospital, according to reports this morning. Berkeleyside will update the story as more information emerges.
Related:
Shooting at Cal’s Haas School of Business [11.15.11]
