Ga. town remembers victims as manhunt continues

By GREG BLUESTEIN
The Associated Press
Wednesday, April 29, 2009 2:52 AM 

ATHENS, Ga. -- The manhunt for a University of Georgia professor suspected of killing his wife and two men widened Tuesday as the campus held a solemn vigil to remember the victims.

Authorities across the nation and in Europe have been enlisted to search for marketing professor George M. Zinkhan, who has not been seen since the shootings near campus Saturday.

As the search broadens, life on campus has largely returned to normal _ aside from the police officers carrying assault rifles as they patrol school grounds. Campus police believe Zinkhan left the area but say the weapons are a precaution.

The vigil Tuesday night was part of a long-planned annual effort to honor the 22 students, faculty and staff who have died during the past academic year. But UGA President Michael Adams said it held special significance, and he urged students and residents to look to each other for strength as details of the shootings emerge.

"We struggle with what we know. And we struggle with what we yet don't know," he said to a crowd of about 100 who gathered outside a chapel on the school's campus.

Authorities, meanwhile, said they were struggling to find the motive behind the shooting. And Athens-Clarke County Police Capt. Clarence Holeman said the marketing professor is likely long gone.

"Would you be sticking around if you had three murder warrants?" Holeman asked.

Police searched the woods a few miles from Zinkhan's neighborhood Tuesday after receiving a tip that a red Jeep matching the description of Zinkhan's had been seen nearby the day of the shootings. Authorities didn't find the Jeep or any sign of Zinkhan.

Becky Stonecipher said she had spotted a Jeep in her neighbor's driveway and called police Sunday morning after seeing news reports.

"I wish someone had responded earlier," she said at her home in nearby Bogart. "You just never know."

The shootings took place midday Saturday at a gathering of a local theater group at the Athens Community Theater. Killed were Zinkhan's wife Marie Bruce, a 47-year-old attorney, and two members of her theater group, Ben Teague, 63, and Tom Tanner, 40.

Zinkhan, 57, disappeared after the shootings in his 2005 red Jeep Liberty with the Georgia license plate AIX1376.

The search broadened Monday when the FBI revealed that Zinkhan had a May 2 plane ticket to the Netherlands and left behind an empty passport wallet.

Warren French, a business ethics professor and longtime friend, said Zinkhan has traveled to Amsterdam twice a year _ at Christmas and during summer break _ for the last two years. He has taught part-time at the Vrije Universiteit (Free University) since April 2007.

Zinkhan's wanted poster was also posted on the Web site for the Appalachian Trail, where U.S. Park Ranger Eric Barron described Zinkhan as an avid hiker who had spent time on the trail in the past. The 2,178-mile trail's southern terminus is at Georgia's Springer Mountain, about 50 miles northwest of Athens.

In 2003, Zinkhan wrote a short article called "Appalachian Trail, Southern Terminus" for the American Marketing Association's Web site.

Police said Zinkhan left his children, who are 8 and 10, in the Jeep during the shootings and then dropped them off with a neighbor before disappearing. Holeman said they were in the custody of Bruce's brother.

Zinkhan's relatives have been working to help Athens-Clarke County police and the FBI find him, his brother told The Associated Press. Other friends and family members were struggling to explain how cerebral marketing professor could have been involved in the shootings.

"It's awfully hard to talk about it because we just don't understand," said Bruce's aunt Daisy Phelps. "We don't know why. We don't know. All we know is my niece is dead."

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