Gunman Goes Postal Before His Final Rampage

After killing two in the residence hall, but before his murderous rampage at Virginia Tech Norris Hall, the gunman went to the post office and mailed NBC a package containing photos and videos of him brandishing guns and delivering a snarling, profanity-laced rant about rich “brats” and their “hedonistic needs.”

“You had a hundred billion chances and ways to have avoided today,” 23-year-old Cho Seung-Hui says in a harsh monotone, in an excerpt shown on “NBC Nightly News.” “But you decided to spill my blood. You forced me into a corner and gave me only one option. The decision was yours. Now you have blood on your hands that will never wash off.”

NBC said the package contained a rambling and often-incoherent, 1,800-word video manifesto, plus 43 photos, 11 of them showing Cho aiming handguns at the camera.

He repeatedly suggests he was picked on or otherwise hurt.

“You have vandalized my heart, raped my soul and torched my conscience,” he said. “You thought it was one pathetic boy’s life you were extinguishing. Thanks to you, I die like Jesus Christ, to inspire generations of the weak and the defenseless people.”

In another portion of the tape, Cho said, "You love crucifying me, I didn’t have to do it. I could have left. I could have fled. But now I am no longer running. If not for me, for my children and my brothers and sisters that you (expletive). I did it for them.”

He also refers to “martyrs like Eric and Dylan” a reference to the teenage killers Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, who killed 13 people at Columbine High School in Colorado on April 20, 1999.

Word of hate towards wealthy kids. “Your Mercedes wasn’t enough, you brats,” he says, apparently reading from a manifesto. “Your golden necklaces weren’t enough, you snobs. Your trust funds wasn’t enough. Your vodka and cognac wasn’t enough. All your debaucheries weren’t enough. Those weren’t enough to fulfill your hedonistic needs. You had everything.”

NBC News said Cho sent the "long and rambling communication" to the network, and it was delivered Wednesday morning to NBC News chief Steve Capus. A time stamp on the mailed package indicates it was sent at 9:01 a.m. Monday, about an hour and 45 minutes after Cho killed two people in a campus dormitory.

A short while later, he opened fire in a university engineering building, killing 30 people. Then he killed himself as police closed in.

Network officials said the material was hand-delivered to Capus on Wednesday by a New York City postal employee who saw the return address and realized it was important. NBC turned the package over to the FBI and said they would not immediately disclose all its contents pending the agency’s review.

If the package was indeed mailed between the first attack and the second, as the time stamp indicates, that would help explain where Cho was and what he did during that two-hour window.


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Raw Video: NBC Releases Gunman Video Manifesto