Where’d he get all that money though? And all that equipment? It takes alot of planning, and with no obvious background it does seem somewhat suspicious.
Considering that we have yet to hear anything about his personal like ... could he have been employed? Living off the largess of his parents? We know nothing substantial about him yet. Until we know a little more about him I will reserve my speculation. To do otherwise would put me in the same category as Brian Ross.
From what I’ve read he did do a lot of planning, purchased the guns over several months going back to at least May. His mother lives in a house valued at $400k so he wasn’t exactly a poor kid. Plus until June he had a job in the research lab at the medical school, I imagine that pays fairly well and he was living in a relatively inexpensive apartment that mostly houses students from the university.
As for no obvious background, he had a degree in neuroscience and as I said, worked in the research lab at the medical school. So as far as rigging the apartment with explosives and booby traps, he was certainly smart enough to figure out how to do that without any help plus might have had access to chemicals. He might be bat guano crazy but that doesn’t mean he is stupid.
A crazy person can be very dangerous. A crazy person who is also very intelligent is doubly dangerous.
Where’d he get all that money though?
1. We don’t know if his parents subsidized him.
2. As a PhD Student, he was probably on a full ride (almost all the fulltime PhD students at decent schools are).
3. He would still be eligible for student loans, giving him extra money.
4. Credit cards.
5. Not paying bills for a few months. It takes a while for that kind of behavior to catch up with you. If you pay the rent so that you aren’t on the street, you can put off paying a lot of folks for a long time.
Where he got the money would be the least of my concerns. The planning with no military or law enforcement background is more curious. That said, there’s a ton o’stuff on the internet. All he would need is interest and time. You’d be surprised at the stuff I learned how to do, right here on FR. : )