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Two pages of shooting notes found in dead gunman’s backpack

Police have “no idea why” a 43-year-old man killed three Michigan State University students and wounded five others before turning the gun on himself in the latest mass shooting.

Anthony Dwayne McRae shot himself to death after the rampage on Monday night (local time), said FBI agent Jim Tarasca.

McRae had no known affiliation to the university in East Lansing, about 145 kilometres north-west of Detroit.

CNN reports a source said a two-page note was found in his backpack referencing other shootings such as the King Soopers supermarket shooting in Colorado.

McRae also wrote of schools in New Jersey and claimed there were “20 of him” who would carry out these shootings, CNN reports.

Police said the shooter possibly had plans to target two New Jersey schools.

Sophomore Claire Papoulias was sitting in her Cuban history class when the gunman entered her classroom.

She said she dropped to the floor when she started hearing gunshots directly behind her head.

“I will never forget the screams of my classmates because they were screaming in pain for help,” Ms Papoulias said on NBC’s Today show.

Someone was yelling that there was a shooter and everybody needed to get down on the ground, and at that moment I thought that I was going to die. I was so scared.”

The five wounded students were in critical condition at EW Sparrow Hospital where surgery was performed on four of them, Dr Denny Martin, the hospital’s interim president and chief medical officer, said during the briefing as he struggled to keep his composure.

“I am filled with rage that we have to have another press conference to talk about our children being killed in our schools,” Congresswoman Elissa Slotkin, who represents the area, said.

“If this is not a wake-up call to do something, then I don’t know what is.”

The shooting happened about 48 kilometres south of Oxford, Michigan, where a teenaged gunman in 2021 used a rifle his father bought as a Christmas present to kill four students at the local high school.

The shooting came a day before the five-year anniversary of the Valentine’s Day massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, which left 17 students and teachers dead.

“Another place that is supposed to be about community and togetherness is shattered by bullets and bloodshed. We know that this is a uniquely American problem,” Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer said during the briefing, noting that she spoke to President Joe Biden about the incident.

At about 8.30pm local time, police received a call that shots were fired in Berkey Hall, an academic building on the school’s northern campus.

Officers arrived within minutes and found several people shot, including two who were deceased. Police then began receiving calls about another shooting at a nearby building, where officers found the third fatality, Michigan State University Interim Deputy Chief Chris Rozman said.

Police located the suspect in Lansing at 11.35pm, about three hours after the first report of a shooting. He died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, Mr Rozman said.

He said a citizen who saw the photos of the suspect from surveillance video called in a tip to police that led to authorities finding the gunman.

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