Mass Murder in Prague: What We Know and What We Don’t

“Hey guys, somebody shot downtown,” a message read from one of our colleagues in
Investigace.cz
at 15:20 on Thursday, December 21st. He was close to the place. We soon found out that the shooting happened in the building of the faculty of philosophy of Charles University. Police have so far confirmed 14 victims and another 25 people have been injured. The shooter, a student from the faculty, is dead.

Prague Police Chief Martin Vondrašek later described the events at a press conference.
The gunman first killed his own father in a small town near the Czech capital before noon and while on his way to Prague he planned to kill himself.
He left his home with guns, including at least one assault rifle that he legally owned.
At this point, the police are already looking for him.
He was supposed to attend a class at the Charles University building on Selethna Street, near the center of Prague.
Police evacuated the school, but the shooter did not attend his classes.
Instead, he was already about a 15-minute walk away, in the building of the Faculty of Philosophy on Jan Palach Square, a small picturesque place surrounded by historic buildings, galleries and views of Prague Castle.

The information about the shooting was received a minute before 15:00, and the police arrived at the building of the philosophy department in a few minutes.
At 3:15 p.m., students and faculty members received an email with instructions to lock themselves in the room they are currently in, barricade the doors, turn off the lights, and wait.
They sent messages to their relatives and exchanged information about the situation.
“Are you hiding? Please tell me you’re hiding,” read messages in one of the students’ group chats.
The answers describe where the students were hidden, how they narrowly escaped, and what they saw.

At 4 p.m., police confirmed that the shooter had been “eliminated” — he shot himself when he saw police approaching.

People from the building were then evacuated, and the entire faculty was searched by police and an explosive device disposal team.
Later in the evening, police said they had found a “huge arsenal of weapons” inside the faculty building and that had it not been for their quick response, there would have been even greater bloodshed.
The inspection of the crime scene ends the next day, December 22 at 9 a.m.

Meanwhile, the Czech internet is quickly flooded with more or less accurate information as well as outright misinformation. There are excerpts from messages from student conversations locked in the attacked building. Photos and videos of the traumatic event. Information about another shooter – which police officially denies. Also, alleged information about the shooter’s Telegram account, where he allegedly announced the attack – police are investigating him, but there are signs that the account is fake / messages in it are in impeccable Russian editor’s note. BIRD/. Interior Minister Vit Rakushan asked the media not to publish information about the mass murderer to prevent anyone from considering him an inspiration.

Police say there were several threatening calls where someone wanted to shoot people as a reaction.
They also announced that they would track all forms of online comments and content endorsing the attack.

Since Thursday night, students, friends and professors have been exchanging messages on social media trying to connect with their loved ones.
Late at night, a list of missing people appeared, most of whom were women.
Police identified all the victims by Friday morning.
The Department of Music Sciences at Charles University announced that its director was one of the victims.

Most of the victims are in stable condition, some had to be operated on Thursday evening.

The mass shooting — the worst case of serial murder in Czech history — raises an important question: is it too easy to get a firearm license?
In the Czech Republic, general practitioners must approve such a license – and can request a psychological test or simply sign the patient’s documents.
In the case of large firearms, their acquisition must be approved by the police.
But this step is also seen primarily as a formality.
For example, the shooter from the University of Prague had a permit to possess 8 firearms, two of which were combat weapons.

The right to defend oneself with firearms is enshrined in the Czech Declaration of Human Rights, which was a reaction to the European gun regulation.

Police are absolutely certain that the shooter is also responsible for another murder from a few days ago, when a man and a baby in a stroller were shot dead in the Klannowice forest near Prague.

As a senior police officer said at a news conference Friday, the shooting “was either a system failure or a single individual’s failure.”
Now it’s up to Czech journalists to understand it.

VSquare
| Author: Zuzana Shotova /
Investigace.cz

Lead photo: Josef Schlerka / Investigace.cz
Translation: BIRD.BG

The editorial office and the journalists from BIRD express their sincere condolences to the relatives of the victims.

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