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Police examine Frein's ESU life

TANNERSVILLE State police seized a jump drive and paperwork from various East Stroudsburg University departments in an attempt to learn more about accused cop killer Eric Matthew Frein, according to search warrant documents obtained by The Times-Tribune, a Times-Shamrock newspaper.

The documents, filed with Magisterial District Judge Thomas E. Olsen in Tannersville, do not state what was on the jump drive or what was in the school documents, but an affidavit filed in support of the warrant states authorities are looking for any clues about Frein, 31, of 308 Seneca Lane, Canadensis.A self-described survivalist, Frein is the sole suspect in the Sept. 12 late-night sniper attack at the Blooming Grove state police barracks in Pike County.Police accuse Frein of using a .308 caliber rifle to shoot and kill Cpl. Bryon K. Dickson II of Dunmore and wound trooper Alex T. Douglass of Olyphant outside the barracks."Through my training and experience with the Pennsylvania State Police over the previous 10 years, I am aware that university records are valuable investigative tools to discern several analytical aspects of a student's tenure at a facility," wrote trooper William B. Skotleski in the search warrant request and affidavit filed Sept. 24.The documents were not made public until this week, when the inventory of items seized was attached to the warrant.Frein attended East Stroudsburg University as a history major for one semester in 2005, and then for two semesters six years later as a chemistry major. He did not earn a degree.Specifically, state police sought documents from the East Stroudsburg University Registrar's office, which would include registration information, class schedules, class rosters, professors, advisers, counselors, extracurricular activities and student advisers and tutors.They also asked for any incident reports from the campus police department that may have involved Frein, computer passwords and Internet searches, billing information and anything related to his student identification card which he needed to enter dorms, libraries, cafeterias and other campus buildings.Though he hasn't attended classes at the university since 2011, Frein often spent time on and near the campus.He crashed alone at his longtime friend Justin Smith's apartment at 135 Ridgeway St., East Stroudsburg, the night before the barracks shooting, according to another search warrant affidavit obtained by the newspaper late last week.Frein also texted Smith just hours before the Sept. 12 shooting that "all is good" and that he was "heading back to Delaware" and that he would be back next week, the records showed.After obtaining the search warrant for Smith's apartment, police seized Smith's cellphone, several boxes of ammunition and 10 dirty gun cleaning patches.After the barracks ambush, police say Frein drove away in his parents' Jeep Cherokee, but crashed in a swampy retention pond two miles north of the barracks.He then fled, leaving behind his Social Security card and bullet casings with tool markings matching the ones recovered from across the barracks.Handwriting experts are analyzing papers found in the woods that chronicle the shooting death of a Blooming Grove state police corporal to determine if Frein penned them.The handwritten notes are more like a log of events since the shooting rather than a letter as reported Monday by television news.State police say that Frein has a grudge against law enforcement. The writings, however, did not provide a motive for the barracks attack.Sources declined to comment on whether the writings contained only details the shooter would know.The hunt for Frein entered its 26th day Wednesday. Authorities focused search efforts on a large patch of woods south of Snow Hill Road in Price Township near the Frein home.Hundreds of state police vehicles gleamed in the sunlight in a muddy lot adjacent to Laurel Run Road, which runs west, then north to Snow Hill Road.Law enforcement continue to search with a five-mile perimeter straddling Price and Barrett townships in Monroe County because of several recent sightings of Frein there.