UW couldn't stop troubled doctor from buying gun

More than a month before Wednesday's shooting at the University of Washington Medical Center, Dr. Jian Chen's supervisors knew he was upset about his looming termination. They also knew he was trying to buy a gun.

Yesterday, his supervisors said they had done everything possible to look into the situation and to help Chen, 42, through the anxiety surrounding their decision not to renew his contract, which was to expire tomorrow.

There was little more they could have done, the officials said, to prevent Wednesday's tragic shooting, in which Chen killed himself and Dr. Rodger Haggitt, 57, an eminent pathologist who was said to have been a mentor and father figure for Chen.

Medical center officials met with Chen and a university police officer May 23, the day a resident in the pathology department discovered Chen had been using his department computer to arrange buying a gun.

At the meeting, the officials asked Chen why he was looking to purchase a weapon, worried he might be planning suicide. Chen said it was for self-defense and that he had no plans to harm himself or anyone else.

Police say Chen bought a .357 Glock handgun at Wade's Eastside Gun Shop in Bellevue on June 6, picking it up June 12 after the mandatory waiting period. They believe he used that gun Wednesday, shooting Haggitt four times and himself once.

The King Country Medical Examiner's Office has described the deaths as murder-suicide.

When they met with Chen, officials suggested he seek counseling to deal with the stress of being terminated. They later tried to find friends of his in the area who might help him, but located none.

Chen lived in the University District, but was born in China. A brother lives in China, but Chen had no family in the United States.

"He was very adamant that he had no psychological problems whatsoever and that his only problem was his career," said Dr. John Gienapp, director of graduate medical programs at the medical center, who was at the May 23 meeting.

Chen was told at the meeting that it is illegal to bring a gun onto the UW campus, Gienapp said.

Beyond that, university officials and police said yesterday, there was nothing more they could legally do. Chen had not made any specific threats to anyone. He became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1999, and therefore could legally own a gun. And if he refused offers of counseling, they said, they couldn't legally force it upon him.

Last fall, Chen's supervisors in the pathology department decided his performance as a resident was subpar and that his English proficiency was not good enough - and they told him so.

They recommended he take classes to improve his English, said Dr. Nelson Fausto, chairman of the pathology department. And they tried to give him special attention.

But Fausto said that neither Chen's facility with English nor his performance improved, and that it is unclear whether Chen even took the recommended English classes.

In November 1999, Chen was officially told his contract would not be renewed, Fausto said. The department's plan was to provide Chen with counseling and help him secure a residency at a less-demanding program until his contract ran out.

Chen took his remaining time as an opportunity to reverse his fate.

"He would try to prove himself," Fausto said. "He refused to acknowledge that the best course here was to move on to another program."

This may have stemmed partly from Chen's Asian heritage, said Fausto, himself an emigrant from Brazil. Fausto said he tried hard to be sensitive to the cultural chasm between Chen and the American institution at which he was studying.

"We know that for an individual like him, the loss of face and admitting a failure was a major issue," Fausto said.

In March, Chen made little effort to land a new residency through the annual National Resident Matching Program.

In May, when it became widely known Chen was shopping for a gun, people in the pathology department became concerned both for his safety and theirs. Some locked their doors when Chen was around.

"There was considerable concern and consternation on the part of the department faculty," said Dr. John Coombs, associate dean of the School of Medicine. "And there was fear as well."

But those in charge apparently felt there was nothing more to do except wait for his contract to expire.

"I think everyone involved did what they could," said university police Capt. Randy Stegmeier. "This was certainly a very tragic and unfortunate event that occurred despite the efforts of those around him. I do not believe that there is any blame here. It is simply a tragedy."

It's a tragedy that is causing the medical school to reflect on how it dealt with Chen.

"We are very carefully reviewing everything in regard to this," Coombs said. "However, I want to emphasize the fact that we are treating this as an isolated incident."

Fausto yesterday said it was difficult to find words to express the loss to the medical school resulting from Haggitt's death.

"We cannot replace him," Fausto said. "The word in academia is that everyone is replaceable, but he was not replaceable."