He was an athletic legacy, at least.
As to his academic capacity, I have no way of knowing, nor do you. However, it is well documented that the college years are a time of life in which serious mental illness can emerge, especially in young men. It is possible that he was highly functioning before the emergence of schizophrenia, or whatever he might have. He could also have/have had a drug habit. Killing his father makes no rational sense. It does not sound from the newspaper reports as if he had made a plan to “get away with it.” He may have been grandiose enough to believe he could start his own hedge fund, and have blamed his father for his lack of success (feeling persecuted.) (grandiosity and feeling persecuted are both signs of schizophrenia.) See: http://www.nami.org/Template.cfm?Section=By_Illness&template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=168518, and http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/health/The_Real_World__Recognizing_Mental_Illness_in_Young_Adults.html.