Austria gunman had become fascinated with school shootings, investigators say

Audio By Carbonatix

Enlarge

VIENNA (AP) — A former student who killed nine students and a teacher in Austria a week ago and then took his own life had become fascinated with school shootings in recent years, but his motive for the rampage remains unclear, investigators said Tuesday.

Police have said the 21-year-old gunman planned last Tuesday’s roughly seven-minute attack at the BORG Dreierschützengasse high school in Graz, which he left three years ago, down to the smallest detail. But much remains uncertain: among other things, why he chose that particular date and why he stopped shooting when he did.

After his body was found, investigators found that the shooter still had 24 bullets in two magazines and another 18 loose bullets for his Glock handgun, as well as 17 bullets for his shotgun, said Michael Lohnegger, the head of Styria province’s criminal police office.

A few minutes before the shooting began, the gunman took a picture showing his legs and boots in a school bathroom and posted it to a social media account, Lohnegger said. Investigators are still working through some 30 other accounts attributed to him, created between 2019 and this year, to determine which are genuine.

They can “say with certainty that, over the years, he developed a significant passion in general terms for the phenomenon of school shootings,” Lohnegger said. “He glorifies not just the acts in general, but also the perpetrators who carried out these acts.”

However, he said, police still have no information on his motive for the shooting.

Eleven people were wounded last week. As of Tuesday, two had been released from hospitals but nine were still being treated, two of whom were still in intensive care, Lohnegger said. Their lives were not in danger.

Chancellor Christian Stocker said Monday that Austria will tighten its gun laws, which are among the more liberal in the European Union. The gunman owned the two firearms he used legally.