The man who fatally shot three Michigan State University students and wounded five others before committing suicide Monday evening had a history of mental illness, according to police. Authorities also reported that the assailant carried a note in his pocket indicating a threat to two New Jersey schools.
Investigators established the apparent New Jersey connection to the suspect during their investigation into possible motives after Anthony Dwayne McRae, 43, opened fire on the MSU campus in East Lansing on the night of Feb. 13. The campus is located around 90 miles west of Detroit.
McRae was a resident of the nearby city of Lansing, Michigan. Local police have not established any link between the shooter and either the victims or the university.
“We have no idea why he came to campus to do this,” Chris Rozman, interim deputy chief of MSU police, told reporters early Tuesday.
According to authorities, the shooting took place around 8:30 p.m. local time. The campus and surrounding area were closed off as police conducted door-to-door searches for the assailant. Police found McRae around three hours later in Lansing. It’s currently unclear whether McRae had already died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound when officers arrived.
Police had followed a tip-off from members of the public after two still images from a surveillance video were released.
The images showed McRae entering a building with what appeared to be a pistol, although authorities have not disclosed the exact type of weapon he was carrying. The video showed the assailant dressed in a jacket and baseball cap and with the bottom part of his face covered by a black mask as he went up a flight of stairs.
New Jersey Ties
Police found a note in the man’s pocket as part of their investigation. According to authorities in Ewing, New Jersey, the note indicated a threat to two local public schools. Further investigations revealed that McRae had ties to the Ewing community as well as a history of mental health issues.
“As the investigation continued, and out of an abundance of caution, the Ewing public schools were closed for the day. Officers from Ewing and surrounding agencies were stationed at each closed public school as well as the other schools in the Township,” Ewing Police department posted on social media. However, Ewing police confirmed that the incident was isolated to Michigan and that there was no threat to schools in Ewing, which were scheduled to reopen on Tuesday.
Previous Arrest
McRae reportedly often fired his gun at his property and was described as “a real hell-raiser” by an 85-year-old neighbor, who did not wish to be named.
“We’d hear the gunfire all the time, and then it seemed the cops were always down there for something,” the neighbor said.
A Michigan Department of Corrections document shows that Anthony Dwayne McRae had previously been arrested in 2019 for carrying a loaded firearm in or on a vehicle. McRae did not serve time in prison, however, but was sentenced to probation.
According to a statement made to the Washington Post by McRae’s father Michael, his son had lied repeatedly about having a gun at his home.
Reliving Trauma
Following the shooting, all classes and activities at MSU were canceled for 48 hours. Sophomore Claire Papoulias was in her Cuban history class when the shooter stormed in. She immediately dropped to the floor after hearing gunshots directly behind her.
“I will never forget the screams of my classmates because they were screaming in pain for help,” she said. “Someone was yelling that there was a shooter and everybody needed to get down on the ground, and at that moment I thought that I was going to die. I was so scared,” Papoulias told NBC’s Today show.
Four of the five wounded students underwent surgery at E.W. Sparrow Hospital in Lansing and remain in critical condition, according to the hospital’s chief medical officer, Dr. Denny Martin.
Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) referred to the incident as a wake-up call. “I am filled with rage that we have to have another press conference to talk about our children being killed in their schools,” Slotkin said at a briefing in East Lansing. “If this is not a wake-up call to do something, I don’t know what is.”
A previous shooting happened in 2021 in neighboring Oxford, Michigan, which lies around 30 miles south of East Lansing. The teenager killed four students at the local high school with a handgun gifted to him by his father as a Christmas present.
Monday’s shooting was followed by the fifth anniversary of the Valentine’s Day massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, which killed 17 people.
Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer decried the incident during the briefing, saying she had spoken to President Biden about the tragedy.
“Another place that is supposed to be about community and togetherness is shattered by bullets and bloodshed,” she said.
The victims of the shooting have been identified by University police as Alexandria Verner, a junior from Clawson, Michigan; Brian Fraser, a sophomore from Grosse Pointe, Michigan; and Arielle Anderson, a junior and also of Grosse Pointe.
Reuters contributed to this article.
