Kerch college attack: what was known by 23 October 2018
A look back at the Kerch Polytechnic College massacre of 17 October 2018 and the details reported about the attacker.
What was known about the Kerch Polytechnic College massacre by 23 October 2018, six days after it happened? On 17 October 2018 a double bombing and shooting attack at the college in Kerch, Crimea, left 20 people dead.
The attacker was an 18-year-old student at the college. He carried out the gun and bomb attack and then took his own life. As reported at the time, he hated the technical school very much and had vowed revenge on his teacher.
The scale of the attack
Later accounts named the perpetrator as Vladislav Roslyakov and put the number of wounded at 73, in addition to the 20 killed. The same accounts described it as the deadliest school shooting in Russia or Ukraine since the 2004 Beslan school siege.
What the case showed
The reported motive was personal: a student's grievance against his school and a teacher. The attack combined explosives and firearms, and it ended with the attacker's suicide, which meant the case centred on the circumstances of one young man's actions rather than on a group.
