Ala. Prof's Family, Friends: No Hint of Violence

An Alabama professor accused of shooting six colleagues was vocal in her resentment over being denied tenure and the looming loss of her teaching post, though relatives and students said she had never suggested she might become violent. Everyone from family and friends to Amy Bishop's students at the University of Alabama in Huntsville said the intelligent and at times awkward teacher seemed normal in the hours before police say she opened fire in a faculty meeting Friday afternoon.

The chair of the chemistry department says Bishop was up front about the issue of tenure, often bringing it up in meetings where the subject wasn't appropriate. "In committee meetings she didn't pretend that it wasn't happening. She was even loud about it: That they denied her tenure and she was appealing it, blah, blah, blah." Police say the gun she's accused of using wasn't registered, and investigators don't know how or where she got it. Jim Anderson, the father of Bishop's husband, James Anderson, told the AP his son had no idea Bishop was planning the bloodshed she's accused of. (More Huntsville campus shootings stories.)