The Deadly Professor
The Wounded and the Dead
Three of Amy Bishop's colleagues died almost instantly. Three more were injured.
Maria Ragland Davis, 50, was the first hit, shot in the head. Her love of animals—a pet duck used to follow her around as she grew up in Detroit—had led her to biology, where she specialized in cell and developmental biology, even after a bout with breast cancer jeopardized her studies at North Carolina State University.
Department Chair Gopi Podila, 52, was shot in the chest. He'd left India to earn advanced degrees at Louisiana State University and Indiana State University, where he studied tree genomics. He'd supported Bishop's bid for tenure. Biochemistry professor Joseph Ng recalls that Podila cared about his all colleagues and had urged him to start a family to pass on his knowledge and love to his own children. Podila left behind a wife and two teenage daughters.
Adriel Johnston, 52, was also shot in the head. An associate professor specializing in cell biology and nutritional pathology, he'd been an Eagle Scout. As assistant scout master of his two sons' troop, Johnston taught the Boy Scouts about science.
Molecular biologist Luis Cruz-Vera, 42, was hit in the chest, but released from the hospital just a day later.
A shot to the head sent microbiologist Joseph Leahy, 50, to Huntsville Hospital's neuro-intensive unit before he could be released.
Staff member Stephanie Monticciolo, 62, took notes at the meeting. She was shot in the face but survived.
No one has disputed that Amy Bishop held the gun.