Reports: Chris Harper Mercer, 26, Identified as #UCCShooting Gunman

Posted on | October 1, 2015 | 55 Comments

Citing law enforcement sources, CBS News was the first to identify the Umpqua Community College gunman as 26-year-old Chris Harper Mercer. The New York Times reports that it has independently confirmed Harper as the gunman who was killed by officers responding to the massacre at the campus in Roseburg, Oregon.

At least ten people were killed in the shooting, and nothing has been confirmed about Mercer’s background or motives. It has been reported by the Oregonian and by the New York Post that Mercer targeted Christians in the attack, and that he was originally from Torrance, California. Several other claims from various sources about Mercer’s possible motives cannot be confirmed yet.

UPDATE: Badger Pundit reports that Mercer had this on his profile at a dating site for Wiccans and other “spiritual” types:

Hobbies & Interests include “killing zombies, movies, music.”
Ethnicity: “Mixed Race.”
Have Kids: “no — do not want kids”
I currently live “with parents”
Religious: “Not Religious”
Music: “Industrial, Punk, Rock”
Hair Style: “shaved head, short hair”
Groups: “Doesn’t Like Organized Religious; Left-hand Path; Magick and Occult”

UPDATE II: The gunman was an immigrant, born in England. The UK Guardian describes more of Mercer’s apparent online activity:

Harper-Mercer was the son of Ian Mercer and Laurel Margaret Harper. Mercer and Harper filed for divorce on 6 June 2006. He appears to have left an online footprint that hints at interest in mass shootings as well as apparent support for the IRA.
He also appears to have been a prolific user of the file-sharing system Bittorrent.
An email address, “[email protected]”, was found to be associated with a Chris Harper Mercer of Winchester, Oregon, via a public records search. That address is linked to an account on the torrent upload site kat-ph.proxy-x.com, which bears the username “Lithium_Love”.
The final video uploaded by Lithium_Love to the torrent site, just three days ago, was a BBC documentary called Surviving Sandy Hook about the school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, in 2012.
Other uploads include PDFs of the occult magazine Phenomena, conspiracy-themed documentaries including Lost Secrets of the Illuminati, and assorted soft pornography.
There is also a blog attached to the upload account. The first entry was posted on 6 July 2015 and is titled “The material world is a lie.” It says: “Most people will spend hours standing in front of stores just to buy a new iphone … I used to be like that, always concerned about what clothes I had, rather than whether or not I was happy. But not anymore.
“Since then I have learned the truth that such attachments are falsehoods and will only bring misery. This is my first blog post, there will be more to come.”
Other blogposts complain about the uploading habits of other users. Another bemoans the death of horror filmmaker Wes Craven.
A Myspace page bearing Mercer’s name is filled with pictures of masked gunmen and references to the IRA, including a picture of the front page of a the Irish republican newspaper An Phoblacht, bearing the headline “British Army Could Not Defeat IRA”. Another photo to the page carries the words “IRA undefeated army”.

Mercer formerly lived in Torrance, and the Daily Breeze reports indications that Mercer had a history of behavioral problems:

Records show Harper-Mercer, 26, lived in a ground-floor apartment on Arlington Avenue at 230th Street in Torrance with his mother, Laurel Harper, from 2011 to 2013. . . .
Lists of South Bay graduates from 2009 published in the Daily Breeze showed Harper Mercer graduated from the Switzer Learning Center in Torrance with four other students. Switzer teaches students with learning disabilities and emotional issues.
A former behavioral aide at Switzer, who did not want her name used, said the majority of the students at the school are from foster, low-income and single-parent homes. Some of these students were expelled from other schools or had been in trouble with the law.
The school is divided among special needs students and those with behavioral problems.
Records showed Harper Mercer and his mother moved to Winchester, Ore., in 2013. In addition to Torrance, Harper showed previous addresses in Lomita, Harbor Gateway and Lomita.

Category: Crime, Oregon

Comments

55 Responses to “Reports: Chris Harper Mercer, 26, Identified as #UCCShooting Gunman”

Gunman Kills 10 in Shooting Spree at Community College in Oregon : The Other McCain
October 1st, 2015 @ 9:56 pm

[…] Reports: Chris Harper Mercer, 26, Identified as #UCCShooting Gunman […]
Joe Guelph
October 1st, 2015 @ 10:16 pm

Hoo boy — NeoWayland ain’t gonna like this news.
WarEagle82
October 1st, 2015 @ 10:25 pm

The MSM will declare him “White Mixed Race” any moment now, and are desperately looking for any TEA Party member with the initials “CM.”

Somebody needs to explain how taking my firearms from me would have prevented this or any other similar tragedy.
Evi L. Bloggerlady
October 1st, 2015 @ 11:12 pm

He should die with his name mentioned
RKae
October 1st, 2015 @ 11:18 pm

“Doesn’t Like Organized Religious”

Why? Because he believes… what about them?

What has an organized religion done that’s worse than what he did?

Yeah, go ahead and invent your own spirituality, folks. It’s the way of the narcissist.
Daniel Freeman
October 1st, 2015 @ 11:53 pm

Roseburg is boring and unmemorable. I can’t comprehend this. But anyway, here’s a fairly typical Oregonian, outside of the Portland-Eugene corridor:

https://youtu.be/UwL4_KDDuhg
Daniel Freeman
October 2nd, 2015 @ 12:12 am

I will draw attention to one statement, because it is relevant to prior discussions: “The sheriff trusts the people that they give Concealed Carrys to.”

I have heard of out-of-staters from right over the Columbia River having difficulty with reciprocity (and only one sheriff issuing to OOS), which is in keeping with our insular nature.

However. If you’re one of us, then don’t cause trouble and there won’t be trouble. Especially outside of Multnomah County (where Portland is).
Evi L. Bloggerlady
October 2nd, 2015 @ 12:20 am

It is beautiful farm country in the upper Willamette Valley. Mountains in the distance, rolling fertile valley (not quite as rich as the lower valley, but with oaks and prairie).
Daniel Freeman
October 2nd, 2015 @ 12:23 am

See what I mean? That describes vast swathes of the state. There’s nothing really distinctive about it.
Evi L. Bloggerlady
October 2nd, 2015 @ 12:29 am

Compared to 75% of the rest of country it’s spectacular. Oregon politics are…odd, but Oregon is a gorgeous state.
Daniel Freeman
October 2nd, 2015 @ 12:30 am

Yes on both counts.
Daniel Freeman
October 2nd, 2015 @ 12:33 am

I think you mean unmentioned.
Evi L. Bloggerlady
October 2nd, 2015 @ 12:35 am

wouldn’t that be a double negative?
Evi L. Bloggerlady
October 2nd, 2015 @ 12:36 am

It is also the way of Great Deceiver
Daniel Freeman
October 2nd, 2015 @ 12:38 am

Oops, hadn’t refreshed. Never mind.
RKae
October 2nd, 2015 @ 12:56 am

But the really cool thing about inventing your own spirituality is that everything you want to do is sanctioned! None of that pesky “My religion won’t allow me to do such-and-such.”
Daniel Freeman
October 2nd, 2015 @ 3:30 am

Okay, I’m nesting comments, but I just realized this is practically the Oregon motto, and needs to be emphasized:

If you’re one of us, then don’t cause trouble and there won’t be trouble.

This cannot be overstated in any of its parts.
DeadMessenger
October 2nd, 2015 @ 6:09 am

I think mixed race is going to be “white hispanic”.
DeadMessenger
October 2nd, 2015 @ 6:13 am

MSM is going to have trouble casting him as a right-wing Christian gun-clinger. But I bet they’ll figure something out.
Sara Harris
October 2nd, 2015 @ 6:24 am

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trangbang68
October 2nd, 2015 @ 6:28 am

In my erroneous posting of the false identity of the shooter, I bemoaned the dark soul dead nature of a lot of these shooters. This guy seems to fit the profile of an alienated, nihilistic disconnected sociopath. He seems involved in lots of the worst aspects of pop culture. (See W.B. Yeats, “The Second Coming” for a prescient portrait of a world coming unglued…”the worst are filled with passionate intensity”)
Here’s an irony I wonder if any of the media stooges will pick up on. This loser looks like he could have been Obama’s son, a light skinned mixed race alienated narcissist.
kilo6
October 2nd, 2015 @ 6:38 am

That “Left-hand path” thing is bizarre to put it mildly. From the Wiki entry on Left-hand path and right-hand path:

The historian Dave Evans studied self-professed
followers of the Left-Hand Path in the early 21st century, making
several observations about their practices:

-They often reject societal convention and the status quo,
which some suggest is in a search for spiritual freedom. As a part of this, LHP followers embrace magical techniques that would traditionally be viewed as taboo, for instance using sex magic or embracing Satanic imagery.[1]:197 As Mogg Morgan wrote, the “breaking of taboos makes magic more potent and can lead to reintegration and liberation, [for example] the eating of meat in a vegetarian community can have the same liberating effect as anal intercourse in a sexually inhibited straight society.”[5]

-They often question religious or moral dogma, instead adhering to forms of personal anarchism.[1]:198

-They often embrace sexuality and incorporate it into magical ritual.[1]:205

and evidently “The Baphomet, from Eliphas Levi’s Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie, 1854, adopted symbol of some “Left-Hand Path” belief systems.”
upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a4/Baphomet.png

Anyone with a working brain and internet connection who would incorporate “Left-hand path” into their online profile is at least a bit odd (charitable explanation) or maybe just f**king nuts (uncharitable version).

There seems to be a certain similarity between this and Aleister Crowley’s occultism (“do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law” being one of his key phrases), although I’m certainly no expert on occult belief systems.
Of course our POSPOTUS and lying media will probably not mention any of this, they have an agenda to pursue.
Southern Air Pirate
October 2nd, 2015 @ 7:26 am

So he is just like the nutter in AZ that shot up Giffords. A guy who was on the fringe of society to begin with and only went further and further to those fringes because he discovered the so called truth. Won’t matter to the public at large than he was fringe, because the media will overlook his connection to the fringe and find the one little tangent to connect him to right wing political movements and the GOP.
Jeanette Victoria
October 2nd, 2015 @ 7:44 am

Looks like he was a registered Independent also his dating page was edited on the day of the shooting https://web.archive.org/web/*/http://spiritualpassions.com/seeme/ironcross45.html
Evi L. Bloggerlady
October 2nd, 2015 @ 7:46 am

Hell is still hot, hot, hot
CrustyB
October 2nd, 2015 @ 8:07 am

I KNEW IT! One of those damned BitTorrent users!
JeffS
October 2nd, 2015 @ 8:33 am

More accurately, the State Patrol told the border county sheriffs to stop issuing permits to out-of-staters. One county has refused to comply.

However, most counties are still renewing permits previously issued to non-residents.
Steve White
October 2nd, 2015 @ 10:40 am

So another young man who is a shooter. I will go out on a limb and say that in the near future we’ll learned that 1) he was diagnosed with either schizophrenia or schizo-affective disorder 2) his control had been slipping 3) he was off medication 4) his family had some inkling that he was out of control but “had no idea” he was about to snap and 5) he had been in and out of the medical and state systems for a number of years.
Harvey
October 2nd, 2015 @ 11:31 am

Immigrant. Mentally Unstable. I think this story will fall off news radar soon.
Lamprotatia
October 2nd, 2015 @ 12:57 pm

Today the Oregonian is reporting that it is being investigated as a potential hate crime with the possibility of a “racial manifesto.” Since this…human creature…is described as “mixed race” I have to wonder what, precisely that “racial manifesto” might entail. Does anyone know which combination races his background was?

But it’s interesting that THAT makes it a “possible hate crime” but not the targeting of people based on religion. Or maybe I misunderstood the report.
Obama Set’s Off Another Gun Rush: NRA Paaaaarrrty Tonight! | Regular Right Guy
October 2nd, 2015 @ 1:17 pm

[…] Reports: Chris Harper Mercer, 26, Identified as #UCCShooting Gunman […]
Daniel Freeman
October 2nd, 2015 @ 1:46 pm

FWIW, Wicca adds “an’ it harm none” to “do what thou wilt.” It’s a kinder, gentler neo-paganism.

(I had some interesting friends in college, and also a crush on the Charmed ones, so here’s a GIF of Alyssa Milano when her character was turned into a mermaid.)

http://i155.photobucket.com/albums/s298/Scientivore/Women/alyssa_milano_mermaid_468x336_zpsutkqspyq.gif
PapayaSF
October 2nd, 2015 @ 2:13 pm

I agree, except for #3: we may well find out that he was on psychoactive medication.
Kirby McCain
October 2nd, 2015 @ 2:51 pm

MSM reports curiously aren’t telling us things like where did this POS work or where he had worked in the past? The apartments where he lived, public housing?
Matthew W
October 2nd, 2015 @ 3:00 pm

It’s called “lies”
The MSM is very good at it
DeadMessenger
October 2nd, 2015 @ 3:22 pm

1. POS has a history of emotional/mental problems and comes from a broken home with dad out of the picture, thus denying MSM/feminist narrative of how fish don’t need bicycles.

2. POS is not a white bread cracker NRA member, thus denying MSM/liberal narrative of a gun-clinging mass murder spree waiting to happen.

3. POS may have been an entitlements recipient, thus begging the question of where he got the money for guns/ammo. Was he gaming the entitlements process? If he was, that certainly wouldn’t fit the MSM/liberal narrative of poor, poor needy ethnic children starving to death because rich, greedy white people object to paying their “fair share” of taxes.

4. Who knows what possesses the MSM to do/say/support the immoral/objectionable causes they do? It’s probably a matter of protecting their own. On account of they are bigger POS’s than even this POS, I’d argue.
Steve White
October 2nd, 2015 @ 4:02 pm

Another piece falls into place: Mercer tried joining the Army in 2008, flunked out of basic training. Army won’t say why other than “administrative separation”
trangbang68
October 2nd, 2015 @ 4:28 pm

Where pray tell is he an immigrant from?
RKae
October 2nd, 2015 @ 7:11 pm

That’s like the vague “musical differences” excuse we get when a lead singer quits the band.
Steve White
October 2nd, 2015 @ 7:34 pm

Fair enough. Meds might not have been the right ones, or too low or too high a dose…
Quartermaster
October 2nd, 2015 @ 7:41 pm

It’s common to see people “chaptered” in the Army. There was probably something wrong that if the entry testing were more complete might have been caught and he would not have been allowed in at all.

It seems Schizophrenia is common in Caribbean blacks and he may not have been diagnosed prior to reporting. The pressures of basic is meant to catch things that would render someone unsuitable for military service. Given his behavior at Umpqua, it was probably some mental illness. Someone wanted to know what pharmaceuticals he was on, I think it’s probably a reasonable question.
Quartermaster
October 2nd, 2015 @ 7:50 pm

I lived in Albany (about 20 mi south of Salem) from ’60-’66. Really nice area. Good people and during the last period before California migrants seriously started gunking up the place. I still have friends in the area, but I’d never live there now. It was the only place we lived where my father seriously wanted to get out of the Air Force and stay. Had he been able to find a decent job, he would have done just that.

We went to farm stands in the Roseburg area many times. The major crops where we lived were Strawberries, Mint and Green Beans. We’d go south for the truck farm stuff such as Squash and Zuchini.
Quartermaster
October 2nd, 2015 @ 7:52 pm

Neo has a hard time dealing with anything that doesn’t fit his world view.
Quartermaster
October 2nd, 2015 @ 7:53 pm

That’s changing as Oregon goes full insane. Just ask Sweet cakes.
Shawn Smith
October 2nd, 2015 @ 10:08 pm

If tickets were issued for Hell, they’d have “I did it my way” printed across the top.
A Harvard-Educated Feminist : The Other McCain
October 2nd, 2015 @ 10:42 pm

[…] has led me many strange places during my long research into radical feminism. Before news broke of the Oregon shooting Thursday, I was contemplating a 1979 speech by lesbian feminist Adrienne Rich, included in her 1986 […]
DocEpador
October 3rd, 2015 @ 8:10 am

While meds help some of these people, if they are left on their own they usually stop taking them or take them irregularly. Thus they remain a threat to themselves and the community at large, make repeated trips to ER or medical/mental health facilities for “crises” that drain our understaffed mental health system, and remain the best argument for bringing back state institutional care for unstable mentally deranged people. The only problem is that if the State is deciding who is mentally deranged…
A Harvard-Educated Feminist | Living in Anglo-America
October 3rd, 2015 @ 9:04 am

[…] has led me many strange places during my long research into radical feminism. Before news broke of the Oregon shooting Thursday, I was contemplating a 1979 speech by lesbian feminist Adrienne Rich, included in her 1986 […]
Brett
October 3rd, 2015 @ 3:30 pm

Let’s not go easy on ourselves by refusing to note that Mercer’s dating profile, referenced in the post, lists his political views as “conservative, republican.” He was a very confused person.

I’m puzzled that the left hasn’t jumped all over that
Daniel Freeman
October 3rd, 2015 @ 4:52 pm

He was born in the U.K. and was a fan of the IRA — the Irish Republican Army. Since Jeanette Victoria noted above that he was a registered Independent, he might not have meant the same thing by “republican” as we do.

The left is, apparently, just barely smart enough to avoid getting entangled in that muddle, which would just bring more attention to a non-white immigrant who allegedly targeted Christians.