New Clues To Why Gunman Targeted UCLA Professor

LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — Professor Alan Garfinkel described his friend and close colleague, Bill Klug, as gentle, kind and passionate about science.

"He was the nicest guy in the world," Garfinkel said.

Garfinkel said he and Klug worked on a virtual heart together for at least five years. They could test devices and drugs on it to see how a real heart would react.

Klug was murdered by his former engineering student, Mainak Sarkar, who also worked on it before he graduated with a doctorate degree three years ago.

"This thing [virtual heart] is produced by a gigantic piece of code. That piece of code evolved over years from Bill's many excellent grad students and post docs," Garfinkel added.

He said what Sarkar wrote in a recent blog about Klug stealing his code is not true. "No body owns that code," Garfinkel said. "The only person who owns that code is UCLA."

COMPLETE COVERAGE: UCLA Shooting Incident

He said Sarkar was not in touch with reality to think his code was stolen. He said he was not even sure Sarkar's work was used.

Garfinkel said faculty and students will now have to pick up where Klug left off. "I hope we can regroup. But there's no way we're ever going to find anybody to do what he did. I feel very sad for Bill, and I feel very sad for his family."

In the Sarkar's dissertation, he did thank Klug and Garfinkel as well as three others. Garfinkel did not want to reveal which of them was also on the shooter's 'kill list.'