Valery Fabrikant, Concordia professor who killed four colleagues, dies at 86 in prison

Valery Fabrikant, a professor serving a life sentence for murdering four colleagues in a shooting spree at Concordia University in 1992, died on June 27 at Archambault Institution in Quebec of apparent natural causes. He was 86.

An émigré from the Soviet Union who arrived in Montreal in 1979, Fabrikant spent a dozen years at Concordia teaching and conducting research, and 33 years incarcerated, never to be released. Throughout his imprisonment, he never stopped believing the world was out to get him.

In April of this year, still convinced of persecution, Fabrikant sued his own son Isaac in small claims court from his prison cell — a final act of defiance from a man who engaged in conflict with virtually everyone he encountered.

When Fabrikant arrived in Montreal, he talked his way into a research assistant's job in the mechanical engineering department at $7,000 a year. A small man with a domineering personality, he continued to be promoted due to his prolific academic output and talents as a mathematician. But he also launched grievances and lawsuits against colleagues, and after his conviction claimed the university, police, and legal system had conspired to frame him.

In early 1989, according to findings of an inquiry, he told people he understood how things worked in North America: "I know how people get what they want. They shoot a lot of people." Police denied him a gun permit for self-protection in 1990, but he later obtained permission to buy a handgun for target practice. University officials grew so frightened they installed panic buttons in their offices in case he escalated.

On August 24, 1992, Fabrikant walked into Concordia's Henry F. Hall Building carrying three guns and shot five people in different locations, killing four professors: Michael Hogben, Jaan Saber, Phoivos Ziogas, and Christos Pantin. A fifth victim survived.