Perpetrator and Motives
The perpetrator was 36-year-old SDSU mechanical engineering graduate student Frederick Martin Davidson. He was to defend his master's thesis in front of his graduate advisor, Assistant Professor Chen Liang, 32, and two other faculty members, Associate Professors Constantinos Lyrintzis, 36, and O. Preston Lowrey III, 44, at 2:00 p.m. on Thursday, August 15, 1996. San Diego Police investigations after the shooting determined that Davidson made advance plans for the shooting by slipping into the room where he was to defend his thesis at 10:00 a.m., and hiding a handgun and five extra magazines of ammunition in a first aid kit. Each magazine contained 15 rounds of ammunition.
Davidson believed that the three professors and in fact the entire engineering department were involved in a conspiracy against him. Davidson's thesis had been rejected once already, and he may have believed that the faculty would reject his thesis again. Davidson also mentioned to his landlord of two years, Charles Brashear, that he was resentful towards Liang, his graduate advisor, for working long hours in the laboratory with little credit, and receiving busy work that had nothing to do with his thesis. Davidson's lack of employment was also a motive, as he felt Lyrintzis was preventing him from finding work. Lowrey had seen Davidson with old notes that a student should not have, and Lowrey considered that cheating.
Read more about this topic: San Diego State University Shooting
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