The 12-year-old boy who shot and killed a sixth-grade classmate and seriously injured two others at a school in Finland explained that he was the target of bullying, and that was the reason for his attack, police said on Wednesday (3 ).
The boy on Tuesday (2) brought a relative's revolver to the Viertola school, near Helsinki, shot three other 12-year-old students and threatened several others. He had transferred to the school in early 2024, investigators said.
Flags flew at half-mast across the country on Wednesday (3) as authorities mourned the boy's death. Two students remained in hospital after being seriously shot.
“We just discovered today that there was this bullying behind the tragedy,” chief inspector Marko Sarkka told Reuters.
The police's preliminary investigation confirmed that the boy was the target of bullying, investigators said in a separate statement. Sarkka declined to elaborate.
Police did not say whether the attacker sought to target specific individuals.
Finland has seen an increase in the level of bullying in schools, with 8.6% of students who are now around 12 years old saying they have been targeted at least once a week, up from 7.2% in 2019, according to a 2023 study by the THL public health institute.
The license for the handgun used in Wednesday's attack belonged to a relative of the suspect, police said. It was not immediately clear how the shooter got the gun.
“This matter is being investigated by police as a separate firearms offence,” investigators said in a statement.
Source: CNN Brasil
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