Kip Kinkel

Kipland Philip "Kip" Kinkel (born August 30, 1982 in Springfield , Oregon ) is an American gunman. Kinkel killed four people in Springfield, including Thurston High School, on May 20 and 21, 1998, and injured 21 others. He was sentenced to 111.5 years in prison, with the possibility of his being released before 2110 is out of the question. He is the youngest person in Oregon's history to receive a de facto life sentence with no parole.

Course of the crime and arrest

Because he had brought a firearm to school on May 20, 1998 , the 15-year-old Kinkel was released the day before his crime, accompanied by his father Bill Kinkel and threatened with expulsion from school. Once there, he killed his father and, three hours later, his mother, Faith Kinkel, who was returning home. At the same time, Kipland Kinkel had switched the soundtrack of the 1996 film William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet to repeat. His sister Kristin was at the university at the time.

On May 21, 1998, he drove back to Thurston High School in his mother's car, a Ford Explorer . He had a semi-automatic Ruger rifle, a .22 caliber Ruger, a 9 mm Glock 19 from his father, and a hunting knife attached to his leg. In the school hallway he met the student Ben Walker and shot him in the head. He hit and injured another student, Ryan Atteberry. Then he went into the cafeteria and opened fire. 21 students were injured. He shot Mikael Nickolauson in the head, who already had a bullet in his thigh and one in his chest.

17-year-old Jake Ryker, who was hit in the abdomen, had experience with rifles and knew the sound of an empty rifle. When he noticed that the gunman was temporarily out of ammunition, he attacked him before he could reload. His 14-year-old brother Josh Ryker and classmates Adam Walburger, Doug and David Ure helped him overpower Kinkel until the emergency services arrived.

Nickolauson died on the spot, Walker died in the hospital. The other students including Jake Ryker (who was in critical condition at the time) were rushed to hospital with many injuries.

Kinkel was arrested and taken to the police station. During the interrogation he pounced on the policeman Al Warthan with his hunting knife with the words “Shoot me! Kill me! ”(“ Shoot me! Kill me! ”). The officer thwarted the attack with pepper spray. Kinkel later confirmed that he wanted to provoke the officer into shooting him. A police video documents that during the interrogation by Warthan, Kinkel said at least seven times “I had no other choice” and once “God damn it ... these voices inside my head” (“God damn it… these voices in my head"). The defense pleaded insanity and insanity. A number of experts should check this. But the only psychiatrist who had anything to do with Kinkel before the crime testified that the boy was perfectly sane.

Jake Ryker received praise from the National Rifle Association and many conservative media groups to show that NRA training was positive.

process

The attorneys' tactic was to plead insanity. However, on September 24, 1999, three days before the jury was due to come together to pass a verdict, Kinkel pleaded guilty, thereby forfeiting the opportunity to be acquitted due to a mental illness.

In November 1999, Kinkel was sentenced to 111.5 years in prison, without the possibility of a leave of absence. He is serving his sentence at the MacLaren Youth Correctional Facility in Woodburn , Oregon , a boys' education / correction facility.

In January 2004 an application was made for a new defense. The reasons were that Kinkel's lawyers were unsuccessful in their attempt to defend themselves by referring to a mental illness.

Web links

• Interview of the officer with Kinkel after the crime
• salem-news.com: Thurston Shooter Kip Kinkel Transferred to Oregon State Prison , accessed June 9, 2013
• oregonlive.com: Kinkel's boyhood troubles explode in rage, destruction , accessed June 9, 2013