Montreal college gunman "loved guns, hated people"

MONTREAL, Sep 14 (Reuters) A lone gunman who went on a shooting spree at a Montreal college in which one woman died and 19 people were injured, referred to himself as the ''angel of death,'' according to his online journal.

Police confirmed today that the gunman, who died at the scene after a shootout with police during the incident yesterday afternoon, was Kimveer Gill, a 25-year-old man from a Montreal suburb.

On a website devoted to Goth culture, Gill said his credo was: ''Live fast, die young and leave a mutilated corpse.'' Calling himself ''Trench,'' he also wrote on the site, www.vampirefreaks.com, that he loved guns and hated people.

Eyewitnesses at the shooting scene in downtown Montreal said the gunman wore a black trenchcoat and boots and his hair was cut in the punk Mohawk style, close-cropped on the sides.

Montreal health officials said that among the 19 people hurt, six were in critical condition from gunshot wounds including two who were in danger for their lives. The victims' ages ranged from 17 to 48.

The shooting took place in and around Dawson College, an English-language school with about 10,000 students aged between 16 and 19, in the center of Canada's second biggest city.

Eyewitnesses said Gill began shooting outside the college at 12.41 pm (2211 IST) yesterday, before going though its main doors to continue firing in all directions inside.

Police officers, who arrived almost immediately on the scene because they had been in the area on another call, followed him inside.

On his English blog, Gill posted several photographs showing him brandishing guns and a hunting knife, his black hair shorn in a Mohawk cut.

One photo showing the tall, thin man dressed in a black trenchcoat and holding an automatic gun carries the caption: ''Ready for Action.'' ''Anger and hatred simmers within me,'' reads another photo caption.

Another photo shows him holding a black automatic weapon he describes as a CX4 Storm semi-automatic carbine. In another, he brandishes an automatic weapon, admitting: ''I think I have an obsession with guns.'' ''You killed for nothing. You are worthless,'' read one message posted underneath Gill's photos today.

''The only thing I'm sad about in this situation is that you couldn't have removed yourself from the gene pool before harming others. Rot in hell,'' read another message.

Flags flew at half-mast at Quebec government buildings today.

The shooting sent shock waves through Quebec, a mainly French-speaking province of 7.4 million that well remembers the 1989 massacre at the Ecole Polytechnique de Montreal where a gunman killed 14 women before ending his own life.

The Ecole Polytechnique gunman, Marc Lepine, 25, left behind a three-page letter that said feminists had ruined his life and named 19 high-profile Quebec women he wanted to kill.

The Polytechnique shooting spurred Canada's gun control movement, which culminated in Ottawa's gun registry, brought in by the Liberals but which the current minority Conservative government wants to scrap in part.

REUTERS LL HS2102