Killer Was Legal Resident

I was hoping that the first reports--that he was here on a student visa--were correct, because that would have made his purchases illegal. If illegal, there might be some hope of figuring out to prevent these in the future. But this news report indicates otherwise:

He is Cho Seung-Hui, a 23-year-old resident alien of the United States, as first reported by ABC News.

Cho is a South Korean national, a Virginia Tech senior majoring in English and the man who killed 33 people — inlcuding himself — on the Virginia Tech campus Monday.

Sources tell ABC News that Cho killed two people in a dorm room, returned to his own dorm room where he re-armed and left a "disturbing note" before entering a classroom building on the other side of campus to continue his rampage.

Cho's identity has been confirmed with a positive fingerprint match on the guns used in the rampage and with immigration materials.

"Lab results confirm that one of the two weapons seized in Norris Hall was used in both shootings," Virigina Tech Police Chief Wendell Flinchum said at a press conference Tuesday morning.

At this time, police are not looking for a second shooter, however, they did not rule out the possibility that an accomplice may have been involved. Sources say Cho was carrying a backpack that contained receipts for a March purchase of a Glock 9 mm pistol. Witnesses had told authorities that the shooter was carrying a backpack. Police also said this morning that Cho had a .22 caliber pistol. Sections of chain similar to those used to lock the main doors at Norris Hall, the site of the second shooting that left 31 dead, were also found inside a Virginia Tech dormitory, sources confirmed to ABC News.

The first murders, while horrifying, are at least in the range of normal human behavior. He was angry about being jilted, and murdered his ex-girlfriend and her new boyfriend. But chaining the doors shut on classrooms and murdering everyone inside two hours later? This is just incomprehensibly evil.

He left a note. I would be curious to read what it says.

UPDATE: I notice that he was living in the dorms--and thus his possession of the handguns violated the Virginia Tech rules about having guns on campus. Pretty clearly, this didn't stop him from doing so.

This is one of those relatively rare cases where there seems to be no change to the law that could have prevented this except a complete ban on handgun ownership--and that is simply not possible. Eliminating the "no guns" rule of Virginia Tech might have made a difference, but I would not hold out a high probability for this.