Finnish College Killers May Be Linked, Say Police

Kauhajoki, Finland — Detectives believe a gunman who shot dead 10 people at a college in Finland had been in contact with another student responsible for a similar school shooting last year.Matti Saari, 22, who also killed himself at the vocational college in the town of Kauhajoki, 220 miles north of Helsinki, on Tuesday, was guilty of a copycat killing, the police believe.Saari had made a long journey to buy his gun in the town of Joleka in the south of the country where Pekka-Eric Auvinen, 18, killed eight people and himself at his school in November last year.Both men had put videos of themselves firing guns on YouTube before carrying out their attacks and both expressed a similarly worded hatred for humanity.The officer leading the investigation into the Kauhajoki shooting, Jari Neulaniemi, said it was “very likely” the two had been in contact before Auvinen died. He said, “We don’t have that information right now but it would not be a surprise if we found that out.”Mr. Neulaniemi said Saari bought his gun in Jokela less than 11 months ago.Saari, a trainee chef, walked into a classroom where he was supposed to be taking a business studies exam and killed his teacher and nine fellow students with an automatic pistol. He also shot a 21-year-old woman in the head but she survived.A friend of Saari yesterday told how he had been seeing a psychologist and had become obsessed with guns. Joni Helminen said he had finished the exam early and left the classroom at Kauhajoki School of Hospitality minutes before Saari arrived.Mr. Helminen, 21, said: “I used to go shooting with him once a week at a range and he lent me a gun. Matti liked shooting but I never believed he would shoot people. This is very difficult to understand. He was smart and did well at school. He did go to parties but he wasn’t a very sociable person.“He had some problems and he once told me that he had been to see a psychologist but he seemed the same afterwards as before. I was with him the night before and he seemed normal.”Police found two handwritten suicide notes at Saari’s flat in Kauhajoki. One said, “I hate the human race, I hate mankind, I hate the whole world and I want to kill as many people as possible.”The notes disclosed that Saari had first thought about carrying out a massacre in 2002.Saari was spoken to by police about his YouTube videos the day before the shooting but was allowed to keep his gun licence. The prime minister of Finland, Matti Vanhanen, said the police decision would be investigated.

Finnish College Killers May Be Linked, Say Police

Finnish College Killers May Be Linked, Say Police

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