Dawson College

"Life is like a video game... you gotta die sometime."



The Dawson College shooting was perpetrated by 25 year old Kimveer Gill on September 13th, 2006. It is third mass shooting to ever occur in Canada - after the attack in Concordia University in 1992. There were only two deaths - the perpetrator and Anastasia De Sousa.

The Killer
[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]
Kimveer Gill was born on July 9th, 1981, to a pair of Punjabi parents in Lachine, Quebec. He drifted from school to school, but was recognized by his teachers for high academic achievement. However, he was relatively unassuming and did not participate much. Unlike many mass shooters, Gill had a large circle of friends and did not experience any bullying. He had at least eight friends, and his height intimidated anyone who thought of messing with him, according to former friend Dennis Pavia.

In early 1999, Gill received about a month of training from the Canadian Forces Leadership and Recruit School. For an unknown reason, Gill was determined to be unfit for military service and was thus discharged. The training at the school is described as mentally and physically stressful, which may have been a factor. After this, he joined a rifle club to forward his goal of becoming a mercenary. He stayed in this club for the next few years - he even visited one of their firing ranges on the day before the shooting.

During the last years of his life, Gill was extremely influenced by Goth culture. He began an obsession with conspiracy theories and the Columbine High School shooting. He ceased all contact with his friends and fell into a highly depressive period. His mother noticed this extreme change in her son's behavior, but never chose to pursue it.

Gill (a.k.a fatality666) was very active on the internet, mostly taking for pictures on the website VampireFreaks. In some of the photos, Gill poses with the weapons he would later use during the massacre: a hunting knife and a Beretta Cx4 Storm. During the shooting, Gill brought with him a Glock pistol and a sawn-off shotgun, but they saw limited use.
[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

His profile also included a list of favorite media; an obvious influence can be seen from Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, as Gill lists movies like Natural Born Killers and bands like KMFDM and Rammstein.

Movies:

Video Games:

He described Super Columbine Massacre RPG! as his favorite game. Gill also compared himself to the Postal Dude, and says that his character is very relatable: "Postal dude was sad before he became angry and psychotic, that's the part we're never seen in the game. He was normal, but the world made him the way he became".

Music:

The song A Tout le Monde, by Megadeth, was blamed by many for the shooting. This is because it's lyrics deal with a suicide, and it was mentioned in Kimveer's final blog post, just minutes before the shooting occurred.

My thoughts on the shooting:
Dawson College is one of my favorite crime cases, even thought it is quite underrated, and even my Canadian friends don't know much about it. I have memories of being very young and seeing it go down on the news (I live near the border.) I had no idea what was going on, but it was always on the back of my head. Another memory comes from some time last year. I was flipping through Special:Random on Wikipedia when I came across his page. I could relate a lot to him, by reading his taste in music and games, plus his mental health. I had no idea that he committed such a deed. Thus, Dawson is my first step into being interested in true crime, and that's why I spend so much time on it.

Other stuff:
Sorry if the OP isn't very good. This is my first time writing something like this. I also plan on adding some more details on the victim and the event later down the line, so stay tuned for that.

Thanks for posting [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.].

I recently read a comparison of Kimveer Gill and Marc Lepine, another shooter from Montreal who attacked a college in 1989. It covers many of the details of their personal lives and discusses their similarities and differences.
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]
The most interesting part of it, which I had not read about before, was the possible influence of a friend of Gill's, Rajiv Rajan. Here's the part that talks about his friend.

Langman wrote:

He also began spending more time with an old friend named Rajiv Rajan. Mrs. Gill observed that her son was influenced by Rajan. She said, “Rajiv said that it was very easy to manipulate Kimveer because he’s too honest and too trusting.” This raises the question of what Rajan was manipulating Gill to do. Mrs. Gill noticed that even Kimveer’s mannerisms and voice began to mirror that of his friend.

The influence of Rajan becomes an important consideration because in January 2006, he and Gill took photographs of themselves posing with one of Gill’s firearms — the same one he used at Dawson College. In addition, after Gill’s rampage on 13 September 2006, Rajan sent an e-mail to someone indicating that another rampage could occur if his demand for $10 billion was not met. When police searched Rajan’s home, they found a three-page letter of Rajan’s in which he again demanded $10 billion. It was also reported that Rajan had vowed to follow in Gill’s footsteps by carrying out another school shooting. Whether the two men discussed committing a rampage attack is unknown. Despite Rajan’s threats, police found no weapons in his home

He suggests that Gill's deterioration was due to the onset of psychosis related to schizophrenia and wonders if he may have been influenced by Rajan in way that was similar to how Dylan was influenced by Eric (if you believe that theory).

Langman wrote:

Gill admired Harris and Klebold, and apparently modeled himself after Harris. Though I categorized Harris as a psychopath, Gill did not engage in psychopathic behavior or appear to have psychopathic personality traits. He left no history of criminal or sadistic behavior throughout his life. There are not even reports of aggression, explosive anger, manipulation, or narcissism. He was a well-behaved young man who struck people as remarkably gentle.

In fact, the reports of his gentleness are reminiscent of what people said about Dylan Klebold. Klebold was described not only as gentle, but as unusually non-violent. Both Klebold and Gill changed from gentleness to violence. Another possible parallel between the two is that Klebold was influenced by a psychopathic peer (Eric Harris), and Gill may have been influenced by a more dominant peer, too (Rajiv Rajan).

Gill and Klebold differed in the onset of their problems. Klebold struggled with mental health problems throughout his adolescence. Gill sailed through middle school and high school with no evidence of any difficulties. As he entered adulthood, however, his functioning deteriorated and he apparently sought to establish an identity as a powerful person. This would explain his emulation of Eric Harris and admiration of Aryan warriors.

I referred above to Gill’s mental health problems. What sort of problem did he have? I suggest that he had adult-onset schizophrenia. The average age of onset for schizophrenia among males is in the mid-twenties, and this makes sense of what we know about Gill. There were reportedly no signs during his childhood or adolescence of any psychological or social abnormalities. After high school, he tried college, then the military, and then had a series of jobs.

By the time that he was approximately 24 years old, however, he essentially withdrew from life. He didn’t work. He didn’t attend school. He didn’t date. His friends drifted away. He became increasingly isolated and reclusive. He lived with his parents and spent most of his time in his room, speaking less and less to his family. This level of deterioration is consistent with someone struggling with schizophrenia. In addition, his writings suggest paranoid delusions and delusions of grandeur. Delusions are one of the diagnostic criteria for schizophrenia.

Are there alternative explanations? Social withdrawal could be the result of depression. If he were just depressed, however, he would not be paranoid or have delusions of grandeur. Besides, his online writing is more notable for anger and contempt than depression. Dylan Klebold’s journal clearly documented his anguish, depression, self-loathing, and suicidal thoughts. The same is true of Jeffrey Weise’s online posts. Gill’s writings do not reveal significant signs of depression.

Why were there so few deaths? 20 shot and only 1 fatality

STK wrote:

Why were there so few deaths? 20 shot and only 1 fatality

I wonder about this, too. Supposedly, he had weapons training from his brief time in a military program and visited a shooting range before the killings. Maybe he didn't aim to kill. It could be worth mentioning that in his final message on the VampireFreaks websites, two hours before the shooting, he said "Whiskey in the morning, mmmmm, mmmmmmm good!!" so it's possible that he was somewhat intoxicated when he went to the college.

Kimveer Gill was confronted quickly before he could really get a chance to kill a bunch of people, although he did wound many.

I remember running into a group of students who were fleeing Dawson about 1-2 KM away from the school, trying to find a place to meet up together that day.

It was a very weird, very surreal experience

He probably didn't aim very well and probably shot people in bad areas like Dimitris Patmanidis. What [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] said about the police coming quickly is also another reason why he did bad, and [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] pointing out that he may have been drunk is also another good reason why he didn't do well. And he probably only shot people once before moving on to try and kill as many as possible instead of finishing people off. Adam Lanza also said on his Smiggles account that Kimveer's Beretta carbine had hang fire which might've also been a problem during the shooting. I think he pretty much realised that it was all over when he was shot.

The police were pursuing Kimveer Gill before he entered Dawson College that day.

sororityalpha wrote:

The police were pursuing Kimveer Gill before he entered Dawson College that day.

Why were they coming after Kimveer?

Another failed shooter

Here's Kimveer's Vampire freaks Profile on May 14th 2006:
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

And Here's a blog discussing Kimveer's activity on a true crime website:
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

wait which counter strike was it?
On a side note, lol im surprised Counter Strike didnt get blamed

TheOne99 wrote:

wait which counter strike was it?
On a side note, lol im surprised Counter Strike didnt get blamed

When going back to Kimveer's profile on vampirefreaks, there's no mention of neither Counter-Strike nor Resident Evil 3: Nemesis.

I'm curious how skilled Kimveer would've been if Kimveer played Counter-Strike?

Meh, he may of had a copy of counter strike on his computer or disk form but just never mentioned it on vampire freaks

TheOne99 wrote:

Meh, he may of had a copy of counter strike on his computer or disk form but just never mentioned it on vampire freaks

You might be right because one entry Kimveer wrote "Also gonna add some stuff.....or - Maybe take away some stuff from
my page.....it's too long". The entry was written before May 2006.

Kimveer most likely assumed the police would release a massive report and documents what games Kimveer had, what was on Kimveer's computer, etc.

TheOne99 wrote:

lol im surprised Counter Strike didnt get blamed

Well it wasn't a big enough shooting to get the media vultures to start talking shit.

true. lol

QuestionMark wrote:

TheOne99 wrote:

lol im surprised Counter Strike didnt get blamed

Well it wasn't a big enough shooting to get the media vultures to start talking shit.

The Canadian media was busy demonizing VampireFreaks and Super Columbine Massacre RPG!

STK wrote:

Why were there so few deaths? 20 shot and only 1 fatality

I joined the old "SCMRPG forums" shortly after the Dawson shooting, it was pretty big news there as this was the first shooter who was confirmed to have played SCMRPG itself.

We talked a lot about it, including the high wounded/ low dead ratio. I think the consensus at the time was that this sort of semiautomatic rifle was underpowered to easily reach a high bodycount.

Boy, did Lanza prove all of us wrong in this respect   .

Ziamber II wrote:

Another failed shooter

While I can't claim I have a firm grip on Gill's mental state, I'm convinced that for him suicide was the more important part. On the website he even had an photomanipulated image of his own tombstone with the words: "Lived fast died young. Left a mangled corpse."

The darker parts of the goth culture had an appeal to him, including the death cult. By 2006, goth itself was slowly starting to die as a youth culture. There I go again, rambling about the old times.

Halcyon666 wrote:

QuestionMark wrote:

TheOne99 wrote:

lol im surprised Counter Strike didnt get blamed

Well it wasn't a big enough shooting to get the media vultures to start talking shit.

The Canadian media was busy demonizing VampireFreaks and Super Columbine Massacre RPG!

SCMRPG was getting a lot of flak, especially Danny himself. I remember people coming to the forums just to cuss us out or call us all deranged wannabie killers. Danny never banned anyone, it was against his creed. The Jack Thompson witchunt against violent videogames was still in full swing.

We at SCMRPG forums felt like we were under siege. Then again, there was some "glory derived from infamy" going on as well. We had goths there, but also many counterculture people or anarcho-primitivists who seemed to have fed off the outrage and were always ready to strike a pose.

Whenever I see this image, I always think Kimveer looks like Pauly D

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Sabratha wrote:

STK wrote:

Why were there so few deaths? 20 shot and only 1 fatality

I joined the old "SCMRPG forums" shortly after the Dawson shooting, it was pretty big news there as this was the first shooter who was confirmed to have played SCMRPG itself.

We talked a lot about it, including the high wounded/ low dead ratio. I think the consensus at the time was that this sort of semiautomatic rifle was underpowered to easily reach a high bodycount.

Boy, did Lanza prove all of us wrong in this respect   .

I think Kimveer was just a poor shot. I heard most of his shots were to limbs, not the center mass. Anyone with firearms training will tell you that the latter is far more likely to cause a fatal wound.

Sabratha wrote:

SCMRPG was getting a lot of flak, especially Danny himself. I remember people coming to the forums just to cuss us out or call us all deranged wannabie killers. Danny never banned anyone, it was against his creed. The Jack Thompson witchunt against violent videogames was still in full swing.

We at SCMRPG forums felt like we were under siege. Then again, there was some "glory derived from infamy" going on as well. We had goths there, but also many counterculture people or anarcho-primitivists who seemed to have fed off the outrage and were always ready to strike a pose.

Considering how the forums would undoubtedly  be a hotbed for trolling under the "no banning" policy, would be a lighting rod for controversy, and was rather well known as a place to discuss true crime, I really, really wonder if William ever had an account there.

QuestionMark wrote:

Sabratha wrote:

STK wrote:

Why were there so few deaths? 20 shot and only 1 fatality

I joined the old "SCMRPG forums" shortly after the Dawson shooting, it was pretty big news there as this was the first shooter who was confirmed to have played SCMRPG itself.

We talked a lot about it, including the high wounded/ low dead ratio. I think the consensus at the time was that this sort of semiautomatic rifle was underpowered to easily reach a high bodycount.

Boy, did Lanza prove all of us wrong in this respect   .

I think Kimveer was just a poor shot. I heard most of his shots were to limbs, not the center mass. Anyone with firearms training will tell you that the latter is far more likely to cause a fatal wound.

Yeah, Kimveer's shotplacement was bad because Kimveer's shot placement was at areas which are very survivable such as the abdomen, chest, upper back of head and leg. One of them was shot in the head TWICE at point blank range and survived. When the news arrived, they recorded 2 of the injured moving around as if they weren't even shot.

Sabratha wrote:

STK wrote:

Why were there so few deaths? 20 shot and only 1 fatality

I joined the old "SCMRPG forums" shortly after the Dawson shooting, it was pretty big news there as this was the first shooter who was confirmed to have played SCMRPG itself.

We talked a lot about it, including the high wounded/ low dead ratio. I think the consensus at the time was that this sort of semiautomatic rifle was underpowered to easily reach a high bodycount.

Boy, did Lanza prove all of us wrong in this respect   .

Ziamber II wrote:

Another failed shooter

While I can't claim I have a firm grip on Gill's mental state, I'm convinced that for him suicide was the more important part. On the website he even had an photomanipulated image of his own tombstone with the words: "Lived fast died young. Left a mangled corpse."

The darker parts of the goth culture had an appeal to him, including the death cult. By 2006, goth itself was slowly starting to die as a youth culture. There I go again, rambling about the old times.

Halcyon666 wrote:

QuestionMark wrote:

TheOne99 wrote:

lol im surprised Counter Strike didnt get blamed

Well it wasn't a big enough shooting to get the media vultures to start talking shit.

The Canadian media was busy demonizing VampireFreaks and Super Columbine Massacre RPG!

SCMRPG was getting a lot of flak, especially Danny himself. I remember people coming to the forums just to cuss us out or call us all deranged wannabie killers. Danny never banned anyone, it was against his creed. The Jack Thompson witchunt against violent videogames was still in full swing.

We at SCMRPG forums felt like we were under siege. Then again, there was some "glory derived from infamy" going on as well. We had goths there, but also many counterculture people or anarcho-primitivists who seemed to have fed off the outrage and were always ready to strike a pose.

Well actually It was Alvaro Castillo who first played it

Kimveer seems like a pretty interesting guy, we seem to like the same films.

In Playing Columbine, they discuss the Dawson College shooting and the discussion is very interesting. I recommend you check it out.

Wonder why he didn't use his shotgun, after doing some research on that type of shotgun it's a norinco clone of the remington 870

Ok, I found some shit related to Kimveer that provides new info. I was trying to find excepts of kimveer's journal because the video game based off of him included an except of the journal and a note similar to Dylan Klebold's discussing how it would go and this is what I found so far in my search. Hope you enjoy.  

Here's an image of kimveer's vampire freaks account with the cradle of filth background (the band member from the band on the right is lead singer Dani Filth for those wondering) I should mention, don't go on the website linked without adblock, tons of pop-ups that could result in catching a virus, so be careful.
[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

I found a link of images of the flowers at the school and images of kimveer's pictures on vampirefreaks with the titles
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]
 
A newspaper article I found (will post more when I decide to do more research)
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

A page about an episode of a TV show that aired in 2008 about the attack, no copies exist:
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

I'll go on Kodi and use one of my apps that allows me to stream shows, movies, etc. and see if there's a stream of it on there.

Here's a video with images of kimveer and the profile along with someone speaking and showing others outside the school. Closed caption is on the left for those who cannot speak French:
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Here's a pdf I found discussing the attack:
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

and here's a post discussing how the attack unfolded which provides a lot more detail than other sources I've found so far.
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

So those are what I found so far, i'll post a continuation of more of what I find, I want to do this with Stephen Paddock because I wanna find the doc he was in in the late 80s early 90s being played by the media and other stuff not known much.

If any of what I posted violates forum rules, let me know and i'll remove it and send PMs with the link(s) containing the stuff similar to with E&Ds suicide images.

This is a photo collage of images of kimveer as a child and adolescent. Got this from tumblr.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

@Halycon666 it’s actually from this
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Duke Nukem wrote:

@Halycon666 it’s actually from this
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Cool find, I appreciate it.

I found this interview of Andrew Page (a friend of Kimveer):
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

I wonder what he meant by this?

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

A description of Kimveer being shot by the Police and his suicide:

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Tommy QTR wrote:

A description of Kimveer being shot by the Police and his suicide:

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

I'm very happy you posted this.

Halcyon666 wrote:

Tommy QTR wrote:

A description of Kimveer being shot by the Police and his suicide:

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

I'm very happy you posted this.

Because between you both, and with TheOne99, the 3 of you are always ripping stuff I've posted on my tumblr blog! Why can't you discover new information yourselves? There's plenty of stuff out there without stealing my content in you're prepared to put in the effort.

kittycat wrote:

Halcyon666 wrote:

Tommy QTR wrote:

A description of Kimveer being shot by the Police and his suicide:

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

I'm very happy you posted this.

Because between you both, and with TheOne99, the 3 of you are always ripping stuff I've posted on my tumblr blog! Why can't you discover new information yourselves? There's plenty of stuff out there without stealing my content in you're prepared to put in the effort.

What? Didn't know sorry, I tried to find the original tumblr that posted it but couldn't. Otherwise I would of credited you.

kittycat wrote:

Because between you both, and with TheOne99, the 3 of you are always ripping stuff I've posted on my tumblr blog! Why can't you discover new information yourselves? There's plenty of stuff out there without stealing my content in you're prepared to put in the effort.

I'm sorry for taking what you've posted (i did this with others as well) and posting them on here, there's no excuse for doing this to you and others. I'm mad at myself for doing this stupid and unjustifiable shit to you and others.

Photo of Kimveers senior portrait from the 1998 Rosemere High School yearbook. He signed it as "Kimveer "Terrorist" Gill"

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

yeah, what a terrorist, he killed 1 person then killed himself.

One day before the Dawson College Amoklauf, one of Kimveers friends on VampireFreaks sent him a message stating: "Can Igo play with you ?? I wanna go hunt down the preppies with you! !"

sororityalpha wrote:

yeah, what a terrorist, he killed 1 person then killed himself.

Maybe he was joking around because of his ethnicity/skin color

CadaverCasualty wrote:

One day before the Dawson College Amoklauf, one of Kimveers friends on VampireFreaks sent him a message stating: "Can Igo play with you ?? I wanna go hunt down the preppies with you! !"

Source? Would be creepy if true. Did they ever figure out who it was?

There was a REALLY GOOD YouTube blog video about this shooting, that was on YouTube back in 2006.

But, I can't seem to find it anywhere.

It was one guy sobbing and crying - where HE was in the cafeteria, just before the shooting.

He went outside to smoke a cigarette and then 5 minutes later - boom.

I don't remember the name of the individual that made the video.

I remember he said "my friend Jason was in the hallway when the shooting happened."

I'm trying to remember the title of the video.

"canada shooting 2006" among other tags like "guy shot up my school"
"guy shoots canada college" "2006 shooting" "2006 shooting vlog" and I'm having no luck.

One comment in the video was "Relax dude and watch Family Guy."

That doesn't really help but, I digress.

It was a male, white guy, long brown hair, that originally made the video.

It had to be made back in 2006, he was crying in the video.

The video had to be made the same week of the shooting. It was just him in the video.
Talking to himself in the video. Never strafing off-topic. He didn't know Gill.

I love to see it again. Good old classic 2006 YouTube video. No annoying sound effects and genuine crying in the video.

It was a straight up blog video. No copyright infringement to worry about at all. No news coverage clips in the video.

But then again it's been 15 years.

Preston Condra wrote:

There was a REALLY GOOD YouTube blog video about this shooting, that was on YouTube back in 2006.

But, I can't seem to find it anywhere.

It was one guy sobbing and crying - where HE was in the cafeteria, just before the shooting.

He went outside to smoke a cigarette and then 5 minutes later - boom.

I don't remember the name of the individual that made the video.

I remember he said "my friend Jason was in the hallway when the shooting happened."

I'm trying to remember the title of the video.

"canada shooting 2006" among other tags like "guy shot up my school"
"guy shoots canada college" "2006 shooting" "2006 shooting vlog" and I'm having no luck.

One comment in the video was "Relax dude and watch Family Guy."

That doesn't really help but, I digress.

It was a male, white guy, long brown hair, that originally made the video.

It had to be made back in 2006, he was crying in the video.

The video had to be made the same week of the shooting. It was just him in the video.
Talking to himself in the video. Never strafing off-topic. He didn't know Gill.

I love to see it again. Good old classic 2006 YouTube video. No annoying sound effects and genuine crying in the video.

It was a straight up blog video. No copyright infringement to worry about at all. No news coverage clips in the video.

But then again it's been 15 years.

Most likely privated or lost media.

Preston Condra wrote:

where HE was in the cafeteria, just before the shooting.

He went outside to smoke a cigarette and then 5 minutes later - boom.

Interesting, Kimveer started shooting at people in the smokers pit shortly before entering the school. Sucks that a lot of Dawson videos are lost media now. I had recently read on a forum (as the shooting was happening) where people had said that they had seen video on Youtube of Kimveers body being dragged out (from a bystanders view on the ground).

I just hope the Montreal PD delivers something good on my FOIA request. It's taking them months.

I bid you good luck, on recovering material related to this shooting.

I remember the guy that DID make that Dawson blog video. He didn't have that many videos. Maybe 5-10 at most.

The video itself got maybe...15,000 views at most? A lot for way back when but, not enough for somebody to download.

There was this flat-out-terrible Westroads Mall Shooting blog video from 2007.



If someone can somehow hyperlink and recover a copy of that, then I'm sure someone can hyperlink a working link
for that 2006 blog Dawson College video. That only exists in my memory now.

A website that mocks various shooters in unfunny manner exists.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

And nothing of value was on there on Kimveer's page either.

I found that Westroads Mall blog video (in this post) from Robert Hawkins's page.

.