Karel CHARVA
Classification: Mass murderer
Characteristics: School shooting - ''We have no idea what his motive was,'' a police spokesman said
Number of victims: 5
Date of murders: June 3, 1983
Date of birth: 1949
Victims profile: Two 13-year-old girls, a 12-year-old boy, their 36-year-old teacher, and a policemen, Gisbert Beck, 45
Method of murder: Shooting (two revolvers)
Location: Eppstein-Vockenhausen, Hesse, Germany
Status: Committed suicide by shooting himself the same day
Classroom Gun Rampage Leaves 6 Germans Dead
The New York Times
June 4, 1983
A man waving two pistols burst into a classroom of sixth-graders today and sprayed bullets around the room, killing three children, their teacher and a policeman before killing himself.
Thirteen other children and another teacher were wounded, five of them critically, and 57 children who witnessed the killings were hospitalized with shock.
The police identified the killer as 34-year-old Karel Charva, a native of Prague, The Associated Press reported.
''We have no idea what his motive was,'' a police spokesman said. ''The only witnesses are schoolchildren and they are either injured or in such an extreme state of shock that they cannot answer our questions.''
The man forced his way into the classroom on the second floor of the state school 10 miles west of Frankfurt in midmorning.
Karel Charva
Police have absolutely no idea what led Karel Chavva to flip out like he did. As far as I know they still haven't come up with anything definite. And what exactly did he do?
Well on June 3, 1983 Karel Chavva showed up at a school in Eppstein-Vockenhausen, near Frankfurt, and requested an interview with the headmaster. The school secretary made an appointment and also gave directions where he could find another man he requested to see, Adolf Gelhaar, an English teacher, on the second floor.
Once Chavva had found his way to Gelhaar's classroom he pulled out two revolvers. He then opened the door and entered the room firing indiscriminately at anything. He killed two 13-year-old girls, a 12-year-old boy and a 36-year-old teacher. He also wounded his intended victim, Adolf Gelhaar.
There were two policemen at the school that day instructing students in the schoolyard. They were both unarmed and thought the gun shots were just science experiments. But one of the policemen, Gisbert Beck, 45, thought he might just check the noises out, just in case. He was shot dead not long after.
Karel Chavva went on to injured a further 13 kids, 5 seriously, before tiring of his revenge. Finally, he raised one of his guns to his head and BANG!
When police investigated the crime they found that Chavva was born in Czechoslovakia, but was granted political asylum in Germany 12 years earlier.
He had also been a trainee psychologist, but this line of work seemed to fail as he had been driving Taxi's for the final few years of his life. At no stage in Investigations did they find out why he snapped.
The Wacky Worl of Murder
