A gunman shot dead a police officer and then apparently killed himself at Virginia Tech today, US police and school officials said.

More than four years after the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history, the horrors of that day on the Virginia Tech campus are about to be relived in court.

A MAJOR university in the US was locked down yesterday when three teenage girls attending a summer camp said they saw a man holding what looked like a gun on the Virginia Tech campus where a 2007 massacre left 33 people dead.

A gunman has been reported on campus at Virginia Tech, the site of a 2007 mass shooting, officials say.

Virginia Tech University must pay the maximum $55,000 (€39,000) fine for breaking the law by waiting too long to notify students during the 2007 shooting rampage, but will not lose government aid, the US Department of Education said.

LAST Saturday’s attempted murder of Gabrielle Giffords, a Democratic Party congresswoman from Arizona, and the shooting dead of six onlookers by deranged gunman Jared Lee Loughner has triggered a fierce debate about the health of American democracy and gun laws. For some in Europe the tragic shootings only confirm their prejudice that America is a violent and uncivilised society.

The US government has said Virginia Tech university broke the law by waiting two hours to tell the campus that a gunman was loose at the outset of the deadliest mass shooting in modern American history.

WHITEHAVEN, Egremont and Gosforth might just as easily have been Quilty, Spanish Point and Mullagh, or maybe Courtown, Ballygarret and Knockbrandon. Or, if the truth be told, any shy, idyllic backwater on this island.

A PAIR of disaffected teenagers inspired by the Columbine school massacre planned a copycat killing spree in Britain, a court heard yesterday.

Families of Virginia Tech shooting victims reacted with fury after it emerged that the gunman's missing mental health records were found at the home of a former campus clinic chief more than two years after the incident.

IT IS doubtful if the profession of teaching would be enjoying a new popularity — as revealed by this week’s CAO figures — if those studying to become teachers knew they would have to carry a gun in the classroom.

AS THEY struggle to overcome tragedy, the students and staff at Virginia Tech came together yesterday to mark a year since the deadliest school shooting in US history with flowers, candles and prayers.

US police officers have been seen running into a Cleveland high school where a suspected shooter is a 14-year-old student who was apparently upset about a suspension.

Rapper Nas has slammed US talk show titan Bill O'Reilly as a "racist" for criticising his appearance at a Virginia Tech memorial concert as insulting to the victims of the April massacre.

Virginia Tech officials might have saved lives if they had given out information on the first two shootings on campus sooner, an investigating panel concluded.

The Virginia Tech student who killed 32 people and himself on campus in April had been treated in high school for a mental disorder that left him unable to speak in public, according to newspaper reports.

A 19-year-old woman’s 911 emergency call from the scene of the Virginia Tech shootings was published today.

The piano former Beatle John Lennon used for his song Imagine will be taken to a house near the scene of an American university massacre as part of a tour to highlight peace and non-violence.

Thousands of Virginia Tech graduates struggled to balance joy with grief at ceremonies held less than a month after a student gunman’s rampage devastated the university campus.

Victims of the shooting rampage at Virginia Tech college in the United States were “graduating” alongside their classmates tonight.

About five thousand Virginia Tech students are set to graduate in the US today, less than a month after gunman Seung-Hui Cho shot 32 students and faculty members before turning the gun on himself.

Authorities at Virginia Tech have sent out a questionnaire asking students for any information they may have about gunman Seung-Hui Cho and his first victim.

The family of Seung-Hui Cho might be able to help authorities understand the troubled 23-year-old who killed 32 people at a university last week, Virginia Governor Timothy Kaine said.

A timeline of the Virginia Tech shootings in America has emerged as police provided new details about what happened on that fateful morning 10 days ago.

The US Ambassador to South Korea today urged South Koreans to set aside their culture of collective guilt and not assume responsibility over the murder of 32 students and faculty members at Virginia Tech University.

Virginia Tech students made a sombre return to their US campus today, pausing for a moment of silence to remember the 32 classmates murdered a week ago.

Sun-Kyung Cho, sister of Virginia Tech gunman Seung-Hui Cho has released the following statement in response to the worst school shooting massacre in the history of the U.S.