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- WORLD, Page 33World NotesFRANCEA "Mountain Of Sorrow"
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- While the easy availability of firearms in the U.S. has
- helped produce an epidemic of violent deaths, the affliction is
- not uniquely American. Last week in the French village of
- Luxiol, near the Swiss border, a farmer with a history of mental
- illness managed to obtain a hunting gun and went on a shooting
- spree that lasted 30 minutes. When the rampage was over,
- Christian Dornier, 31, had murdered 14 people, including his
- mother and sister, and wounded his father and eight others.
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- Townsfolk speculated that the killer had become deranged
- because of business problems and opposition to his sister's
- recent marriage. After shooting his relatives, Dornier drove
- through Luxiol (pop. 128) and neighboring communities, picking
- off people along the way. One villager shot Dornier in the neck
- with a rifle, but that did not stop him. Eventually captured by
- police, Dornier was taken to a nearby hospital for emergency
- treatment. On Friday he was transferred to a prison hospital
- near Paris, where he was reported in stable condition. Said
- Luxiol Mayor Roger Clausse, whose five-year-old niece was among
- the dead: "It's appalling, the mountain of sorrow that he has
- caused."
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