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Screenplays purportedly written by the suspected shooter in the Virginia Tech massacre offer a glimpse into the macabre and disturbed mindset of the 23-year-old senior Cho Seung-Hui.
The scripts, brought to public attention by a former classmate of the suspect, feature dialogue packed with obscenity and violence.
In the screenplay called "Richard McBeef," a young man accuses his stepfather of murdering his father to get his mother, and then accuses him of pedophilia when the stepfather puts his hand on the young man's leg, apparently in a friendly gesture.
"What are you, a Catholic priest," the character John rails at the older man in the play. "I will not be molested by an aging, balding, pedophilic stepdad named Dick. Get your hands off me, you sicko. Damn you, Catholic priest. Stop it Michael Jackson."
At the end of the play, the frustrated stepfather hits the 13-year-old stepson, killing him.
The plays, made available by Ian McFarlane, a former Virginia Tech student who now works for AOL.com, have been posted on AOL's "newsbloggers" site.
In a blog posted by McFarlane on Tuesday, he says that members of the class were asked to review each other's work.
"When we read Cho's plays, it was like something out of a nightmare," he writes. "The plays had really twisted, macabre violence that used weapons I wouldn't have even thought of."
Looking back, McFarlane says, Cho fit the "stereotype of what one would typically think of as a 'school shooter' — a loner, obsessed with violence, and serious personal problems."
Cho is suspected of carrying out a shooting spree that left 32 people dead on the Virginia Tech campus.
Referred to counseling
As an English major Cho's creative writing was so disturbing that he was referred to the school’s counseling service.
Professor Carolyn Rude, chairwoman of the university’s English department, said she did not personally know the gunman. But she said she spoke with Lucinda Roy, the department’s director of creative writing, who had Cho in one of her classes and described him as “troubled.”
“There was some concern about him,” Rude said. “Sometimes, in creative writing, people reveal things and you never know if it’s creative or if they’re describing things, if they’re imagining things or just how real it might be. But we’re all alert to not ignore things like this.”
She said Cho was referred to the counseling service, but she said she did not know when, or what the outcome was. Rude refused to release any of his writings or his grades, citing privacy laws.
News reports also said that he may have been taking medication for depression, that he was becoming increasingly violent and erratic, and that he left a note in his dorm in which he railed against “rich kids,” “debauchery” and “deceitful charlatans” on campus.
Information hard to come by
Cho arrived in the United States as boy from South Korea in 1992 and was raised in suburban Washington, D.C., officials said. He was living on campus in a different dorm from the one where Monday’s bloodbath began.
Police and university officials offered no clues as to exactly what set him off on the deadliest shooting rampage in modern U.S. history.
“He was a loner, and we’re having difficulty finding information about him,” school spokesman Larry Hincker said.
Rambling grievances
The Chicago Tribune reported on its Web site that he left a note in his dorm room that included a rambling list of grievances. Citing unidentified sources, the Tribune said he had recently shown troubling signs, including setting a fire in a dorm room and stalking some women.
Investigators believe Cho at some point had been taking medication for depression, the newspaper reported.
Cho was a South Korean immigrant who had been in the United States for 15 years and who held a green card signifying his status as a legal permanent U.S. resident, federal officials said Tuesday.
Cho was listed with a home address in Centreville, Va, a suburb of Washington, D.C., not far from Dulles International Airport.
Immigration records maintained by the Department of Homeland Security show that Cho was born in South Korea on Jan. 18, 1984 and entered the United States through Detroit on Sept. 2, 1992. He had last renewed his green card on Oct. 27, 2003.
Purchased a Glock last month
Cho was found with a backpack containing a receipt for a Glock 9mm pistol that he had bought in March. Ballistics tests by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms showed that one gun was used in Monday’s two separate campus attacks that were two hours apart.
Cho’s fingerprints were found on the two handguns used in both shootings, said two law enforcement officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because the information had not been announced. The serial numbers on the two weapons had been filed off, the officials said.
As a permanent legal resident of the United States, Cho was eligible to buy a handgun unless he had been convicted of any felony criminal charges, a federal immigration official said.
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