Gun rampage school reopens

A German secondary school where a former pupil killed himself and 16 others during a shooting rampage was officially reopened today in a ceremony attended by Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder.

The Gutenberg school has undergone a £6.8m (€9.97m) renovation since April 26, 2002, when 19-year-old Robert Steinhaeuser fatally shot 12 teachers, a secretary, two students and a police officer before turning his gun on himself.

The roughly 600 students and 60 teachers at the school have held classes in another building in the eastern city for the last three years.

Students returned to the school for the first time in July for a “project week” to help them get used to being back in the building.

Steinhaeuser, who had been expelled from the school the previous October for forging a doctor’s note, was a gun club member licensed to own weapons.

The attack led Germany to raise the age for owning recreational firearms from 18 to 21.