eBay account provides clues
BLACKSBURG, Virginia – An eBay account that investigators believe may have belonged to the Virginia Tech shooter was used to buy two ammunition clips for the type of gun used in Monday’s rampage, according to the auction Web site.
The eBay account holder with the handle Blazers5505 recently bought two 10-round magazines for the Walther P22, one of the weapons used in the mass shooting. The clips were bought from a gun shop in Idaho.
The account holder also sold several books with violent themes and tickets to Virginia Tech football games and lists Blacksburg as his address.
A search warrant affidavit filed Friday stated that investigators wanted to search Seung-Hui Cho’s e-mail accounts, including the address Blazers5505@hotmail.com.
The account holder also bought books about violence, death and mayhem.
Family receives body of slaughtered student
JAKARTA, Indonesia – Relatives of an Indonesian student who was killed in the Virginia Tech massacre burst into tears Sunday as his body arrived from the U.S. to their home in the capital under heavy rain.
Partahi “Mora” Lumbantoruan, 34, had been studying civil engineering and died in a hail of bullets two semesters short of getting his doctorate.
Officials lifted his body from the airplane Sunday morning and put it in an ambulance, which sped to an eastern Jakarta suburb where grieving family members were waiting. A foreign ministry official handed over a backpack with his belongings.
“Mora, this is mama,” wailed his stepmother, Sugiyarti, as his coffin was opened for viewing ahead of his burial at a Jakarta cemetery on Monday. Others hung their heads and offered prayers.
“I hope you will rest now.”
South Koreans pray for victims, shooter
SEOUL, South Korea – As a monk beat out a slow rhythm on a traditional wooden fish, South Korean Buddhists mourned Sunday the victims of the Virginia Tech massacre in the U.S. at a memorial service that also remembered the South Korean shooter.
Some 300 people gathered at the Hwagyesa Buddhist temple in Seoul to “pray for the repose of the souls of the deceased at Virginia Tech,” as a banner across a pagoda read. One of the 33 lanterns hung around the pagoda in memory of the deceased was dedicated to the 23-year-old gunman with a tag that read, “The victim who passed away after living a lonely life in isolation.” South Koreans have held memorial services and candlelight vigils since Monday’s shooting, which has led to a sense of collective guilt among some. Cho was born and raised in South Korea until 1992 when he left for the United States with his family at age 8.
“Koreans are extremely embarrassed and feel shameful as a result of Cho’s actions. At any rate, we are sorry for what happened,” former college professor Yae Young-soo said in a speech at a makeshift podium near Seoul’s City Hall.
“No one can deny that (Cho) was clearly a South Korean,” said Park Seh-jik, head of the South Korea Veterans Association.
Fellow band members recognize Clark
EVANS, Ga. – Some 100 members of the Virginia Tech marching band played in a memorial service Saturday for bandmate Ryan Clark, who was remembered as a gregarious young man who went out of his way to make fellow students feel important and included.
Clark, a 22-year-old native of Martinez, Ga., was one of the first victims of Seung-Hui Cho. In Chantilly, Va., more than 1,800 people packed St. Timothy’s Catholic Church for a service for another victim of Monday’s massacre, Reema Samaha, and a memorial service was also held in Virginia for a third slain student.
Hundreds of mourners packed the gym at Clark’s former high school to hear rousing songs from his former bandmates and often cheerful praise for the young man who engaged everybody and had a contagious laughter.
“That’s how Ryan was. He was the type of person that gave his all,” band director David McKee said.
Marks inspire online buzz
RICHMOND – “Ismail Ax” was reportedly scrawled in red ink on the arm of the Virginia Tech university gunman after his shooting rampage that left him and 32 others dead.
It was written on an overnight postage Cho sent between the two shootings. And a variation of it appeared on a file contained in a package sent to NBC television which included Cho’s rambling, hate-filled video, incoherent written messages and photos.
While there is no clear explanation of its meaning, the Internet is abuzz with speculation about the meaning of the phrase “Ismail Ax” on Cho’s arm, “A. Ishmael” on the package and “axishmiel” on the file.
Bloggers and online discussions offer theories on what the words might mean. They have created anagrams, cited poems, books and religious teachings, and floated the suggestion that the phrase was simply the 23-year-old English student’s name for himself.
The most prominent discussions involve references to Muslim religious texts in which God asks Abraham to slay his son Ishmael to prove his loyalty to him.
-From AP reports