Gunman opens fire at city council meeting in Paris suburb, killing 8 officials

<br>NANTERRE, France (AP) _ A part-time school hall monitor armed with semiautomatic pistols sat silently through a six-hour city council meeting Wednesday, then rose and methodically killed eight city

Wednesday, March 27th 2002, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

NANTERRE, France (AP) _ A part-time school hall monitor armed with semiautomatic pistols sat silently through a six-hour city council meeting Wednesday, then rose and methodically killed eight city officials. As he was restrained he shouted: ``Kill me, kill me!''

Nineteen people in the city council chamber were wounded in the attack in the Paris suburb of Nanterre.

As authorities sought a motive, the shooter's mother said her son was deeply disturbed, had been in psychiatric treatment for years and had spoken ``probably 10 to 20 times'' of wanting to kill.

A shocked Prime Minister Lionel Jospin, who rushed to the scene in the early morning darkness, called the shooting rampage ``a case of furious dementia.''

It is ``a horrifying tragedy that harms democracy _ a city council meeting in action,'' Jospin said.

President Jacques Chirac, who met with grieving family members, described the events as ``a completely unimaginable drama.''

Rightist presidential candidate Alain Madelin called the shooting, ``This American-style byproduct, we wished not to have in France.''

Police arrested 33-year-old Richard Durn, who often attended council meetings. Durn did not speak as he shot his victims, nor did he make a statement as he was arrested. He did shout ``kill me, kill me!'' as he was subdued before police arrived to make the arrest, said Nanterre Mayor Jacqueline Fraysse.

Durn's mother, Stephanie Durn, 68, spoke to reporters through the mail slot in the front door of her modest, two-story brick home, which she shared with her son.

``The reason why I think he wanted to kill was because he felt very alone,'' she said, adding he had spoken of wanting to kill ``many times ... probably 10 to 20 times.''

She described her son as a lonely, depressed and troubled man who was in and out of psychiatric care for over a decade.

``When he first went into psychotherapy in 1990, he asked the doctor: 'Help me to die','' she said.

Acquaintances said Durn had trouble keeping a job. He collected unemployment and worked part-time at a nearby elementary school as a hall monitor, Le Monde newspaper reported. He also volunteered at the local branch of France's Human Rights League.

``There was nothing to suggest this man would do such an act, he had never drawn attention to himself,'' Michel Tubiana, the league's president, was quoted in Le Monde.

The attacker fired two semiautomatic Glock pistols and was also armed with a Smith & Wesson .357 magnum revolver, which was never used, police said. Some 50 shells were scattered on the floor of the meeting room after the fusillade.

``I thought it was a joke at first,'' said Samuel Rijik, a municipal official who was at the meeting. ``Some people thought it was firecrackers.'' He said the shooter was firing two weapons at once.

``I crawled under my table and a bullet went through my jacket. I thought I was hit,'' Rijik said.

The assailant was eventually subdued by others in the room after one official threw a chair at him. That official was then seriously wounded when the suspect started firing again with his free hand. No police were present during the attack.

The mayor said she didn't know the attacker and that there had been no heated debate at the meeting which had ended quietly when the shooting began.

``He had been sitting in the public area. He shot straight in front of him, and then he moved to where the council members were sitting.'' The man had waited until there were only officials and bureaucrats left in the room, she said.

``He said nothing,'' she said. ``It was long. It lasted many minutes.''

The murderous rampage did not appear politically motivated as both municipal officials from both ends of the political spectrum were killed. Durn was described as a member of an ecology movement.

``He was somebody opposed to the directives of the city hall,'' said Christian Demercaster, a municipal official from the Green Party who said he'd greeted the attacker before the session. He said Durn wasn't a Green Party member.

The suspect had no criminal record and had a permit for his guns, which he'd bought in 1997 and used for recreational shooting, prosecutors said. His permit came from a gun association.

Durn had been practicing shooting regularly for six years at a club in the Garenne-Colombes region. He had renewed his permit every year, most recently on Jan. 28.

``It seems he regularly practiced shooting, and he never caused any problems to the club,'' said Alain Joly, an official at the French federation governing the sport.

Weeping family members of the victims arrived to identify the bodies, which still lay in the council bloodstained hall Wednesday morning, hours after the shooting. The flag above the building flew at half staff.

Of the 19 wounded, five or six were in grave condition, and the rest were more moderately hurt, authorities said. Others were treated for shock.

The rampage took occurred about 1:15 a.m. as about 40 people attending the meeting put on their coats to leave. Nanterre is a working-class neighborhood near a business district of western Paris.

Dozens of police vehicles and more than 100 rescue officials rushed to the scene. A rescue helicopter took some of the wounded to a nearby hospital.

The issue of crime is at the top of France's political agenda ahead of presidential elections in the spring.

Thousands of police officers held nationwide strikes in December, saying they deserve more pay and better equipment because their jobs have become increasingly risky. The protests started after two officers were shot and killed during an armed robbery in a Paris suburb in October.

In October, a masked gunman opened fire in the central French city of Tours, killing four people.

In an assault in Switzerland last September, a 57-year-old man opened fire with an assault rifle at a meeting of a state legislature, killing 14 people before killing himself with a handgun.