Some news organizations have identified the gunman who walked into a Montreal school, opened fire, and then turned a school cafeteria into a “shooting gallery.” According to reports on CNEWS, he is Canadian-born Kimveer Gill, age 25:
CNEWS: “Kimveer Gill, 25, of Laval poses for a photo posted on the goth website VampireFreaks.com in a long black coat toting a rifle —- a chilling look at the man Sun sources have identified as the gunman who opened fire on students at Montreal’s Dawson College yesterday, killing one woman and injuring 19.”
CNEWS reports:
A trenchcoat-clad shooter with a scowl and a Mohawk haircut turned a college cafeteria into a combat zone with a commando-style assault that left him and a young woman dead Wednesday.
Carrying an automatic rifle, two other guns, and dressed head to toe in black, the man stormed into the sprawling downtown Dawson College and began coldly cutting down students. Another 19 people were injured while hundreds of screaming and sobbing students spilled out onto the city streets in the shadow of the fabled Montreal Forum hockey arena.
At least eight were listed in critical condition. Police said the woman who was killed was 20.
Inside, the cafeteria was transformed for 15 minutes into a shooting gallery in a scene eerily reminiscent of the city’s 1989 Ecole Polytechnique massacre in which 14 women were killed.
The gunman took cover behind a row of vending machines and exchanged gunfire with police while petrified students dropped to the floor in an effort to elude the barrage of bullets.
Surrounded by police, he repeatedly barked a single order each time the officers inched toward him: “Get back! Get back!”
The exchange ended with the attacker slumped on the floor, collapsed in a hail of gunfire.
Police Chief Yvan Delorme confirmed that officers killed the gunman, who was described by provincial police as a 25-year-old from the Montreal region.
Delorme said the attacker sprayed gunfire at random targets. He said provincial police had been called in to investigate, which is customary in a killing involving the local force.
“The only thing I can say is that he was a young man of Canadian origin,” Delorme said.
He said police were able to respond quickly because two officers were already at the college on a drug-related matter when they heard gunshots and took action right away. . . .
The gunman stormed into the school over the lunch hour, with a scowl on his face and an automatic weapon in his hands.
“He looked really mad,” said Mathieu Dominique, 17, who was having a cigarette by the door when the shooter burst in less than three metres away from him.
“He was really into (the) shooting. . . He looked like he really wanted to kill people. . . . It was like, bullet after bullet. It was like a burst – like at least six shots in two seconds.”
Another student, Soher Marous, said the gunman said nothing when he entered the college.
“He had a stone-cold face, there was nothing on his face.” Marous said. “He didn’t yell out any slogans or anything. He just started opening fire. He was a cold-blooded killer.”
The gunman continued firing away as he approached the cafeteria. Andrea Barone was sitting there after lunch with his girlfriend when he heard shots ring out.
“At first I thought it was a firecracker,” said Barone, 17. “Then I turned around and I saw him. He was dressed in a black trenchcoat and I saw his hand firing a handgun in every direction.”
Barone said all the students hit the floor to take cover.
A police officer emerged within seconds from a corner next to the cafeteria and fired on the gunman, he said. The shot missed. . . .
Delorme dismissed suggestions that race or terrorism played a role.
“There’s no information that leads us to believe that it’s something other than what happened at the scene.”
When I went to the site VampireFreaks.com, I couldn’t find a picture of the gunman to confirm CNEWS’s attribution, but I did find an ad for a black trenchcoat at the bottom of the main page. I don’t know whether this ad inspired Gill to buy a trench coat, or even whether he responded to the ad, but the copy for the coat was interesting:
Tough Guy Leather TrenchCoat
Cool way to stay warm this winter! . . .
The aura of brooding masculinity is easy to achieve with this double-breasted full-length leather trenchcoat.