The gunman who unleashed terror on Prague and murdered 14 people was an introverted history ‘nerd’ who had made a homemade bomb in the cellar of his home, it has been claimed.
David Kozak, 24, described as a model student, killed 14 people and injured 25 during yesterday’s deadly rampage in which he targeted students and tourists from the balcony of the Charles University’s philosophy building.
Before launching Kozak’s deadly rampage at the university, during which he was filmed taking shot after shot at his victims, the history student had murdered his father and texted his female friend to say he was suicidal.
Now, it has emerged that police found a homemade bomb in the cellar of Kozak’s home as well as his father’s dead body. A police source told La Stampa the homemade device consisted of a ‘cylinder, ammunition, pyrotechnic material and chemical substances’.
‘The cellar looked like a bunker. The bottle was large, it had several cables connected to it, leading to other equipment. In my opinion, it contained a system that would have caused an explosion,’ the source close to the investigation said.
More details are also emerging about Kozak, with those who knew him describing him as an introverted history ‘nerd’ who was fascinated with guns and hated the world. Kozak, who was a Master’s student of history at Charles University, had completed his undergraduate thesis on 19th century Polish history.
It comes as dramatic police bodycam footage shows cops racing through Charles University to search for Kozak before they found the killer dead on the roof.
The shooter pauses again, taking cover underneath a Ukrainian flag, before walking to the edge of the balcony and resting his rifle on the bannister
Sickening video has now emerged of Kozak, who was a student at the university, standing on the balcony and aiming his rifle at people below, picking his victims off one by one
Now, tense bodycam footage has emerged showing elite cops sprinting towards the building and sprinting up the stairs towards the top floods in a bid to find Kozak who was picking off his victims one by one from the balcony
The brave elite cops barged through a door to the balcony and footage shows Kozak’s body lying on the floor (pictured)
Lenka Hlávková (left), who was the director of the Institute of Music Science at the University’s philosophy department, was identified as one of the 14 people murdered by gunman David Kozak, 24 (right)
A woman breaks down in tears at a memorial during a vigil following a shooting at one of Charles University’s buildings in Prague on Friday
Mourners hug outside the headquarters of Charles University after a mass shooting in Prague on Friday
The tense footage shows elite cops sprinting towards the building and sprinting up the stairs towards the top floods in a bid to find Kozak who was picking off his victims one by one from the balcony.
The brave elite cops barged through a door to the balcony and footage shows Kozak’s body lying on the floor. Police said Kozak, knowing he was surrounded by cops, had killed himself with his shotgun after throwing his elite long-range rifle off the balcony.
Harrowing video shows other police officers discovering injured students inside a classroom and desperately trying to stem their blood loss before evacuating them from the building.
It comes as the first victim of the mass shooting has been identified as Lenka Hlávková, who was the director of the Institute of Music Science at the University’s philosophy department.
The Institute shared a picture of the mother-of-two while confirming her death in the ‘cruel’ attack.
Her colleagues said they were ‘utterly devastated’ that Lenka, who spent her career dedicated to studying the history of music in the Czech Republic, had been ‘senselessly’ murdered.
It comes as sickening footage emerged of Kozak taking shot after shot at his victims from the balcony of the university building as a hero shouted ‘shoot here you f***er’ in a bid to distract him.
Kozak, who was a Master’s student of history at the university, is seen standing on the balcony and aiming his powerful ZEV-30 rifle at people below, picking his victims off one by one.
Kozak, wearing all black, can be seen walking calmly along the balcony and taking aim at the terrified students fleeing the university and tourists who had been gathered in the popular square below.
On the ground, a heroic man can be heard screaming ‘shoot me you f***er’ in a desperate and valiant bid to distract the shooter and save the lives of others, reports newspaper Blesk.
But the 24-year-old ignores his pleas and continues to fire in quick succession at his victims below as the man frantically tells police where exactly Kozak is located on the balcony through a walkie-talkie, urging them to ‘take a shot’ at the shooter.
The shooter pauses again, taking cover underneath a Ukrainian flag, before walking to the edge of the balcony and resting his rifle – which has the power to pierce through body armour – on the bannister. He spots victims fleeing and fires two shots in quick succession as the heroic man screams from below.
The sickening footage shows just how calm and composed the shooter was as he unleashed terror in the mass shooting – the worst in the Czech Republic’s modern history – as he shot dead 14 victims.
Czech police today released bodycam footage of students being evacuated from the building with their hands up before officers raced through the building to search for Kozak.
The elite officers sprinted up the stairs and up to the roof where they found Kozak’s dead body.
Police said Kozak had been trying to hide behind the pillars of the balcony so as not to get shot by officers who were on the ground.
But as he realised he was surrounded by police, he threw his long-range gun off to the ground – and all he had left was his shotgun.
Police said: ‘As we were getting close to him on the balcony, Kozak killed himself.’
Other extraordinary images show terrified students cowering on a ledge high up on a balcony in a bid to hide from the gunman after others were told to barricade themselves in classrooms.
It comes as the Czech police said today that they had identified all 14 victims and told their families, with the government announcing a day of mourning on Saturday. The Interior ministry said there were two UAE citizens and one Dutch person among the injured.
At 12.26pm yesterday, a woman from the village of Hostouň called police to tell them Kozak had sent her a suicidal text message and is not responding to her phone calls.
Ten minutes later, at 12.40pm, police in the area discovered the body of Kozak’s father after he had murdered him as well as equipment resembling an ‘explosive system’ in the family home.
But when police arrived at Kozak’s family home, he was already travelling the 13 miles into the Czech capital where he began randomly shooting people from the balcony of Charles University’s philosophy building.
The shooter legally owned several guns – police said he was heavily armed Thursday and was carrying a lot of ammunition – and that what he did was ‘well thought out, a horrible act,’ Vondrasek said.
He had a huge arsenal of weapons and ammunition with him, with the country’s Interior Minister saying that ‘if the police hadn’t entered the building in time, the perpetrator wouldn’t have been dead on the roof and there would have been a lot more victims.’
In the lead up to his killing spree, Kozak is thought to have kept a diary in Russian on messaging app Telegram, writing in one chilling post: ‘I want to do a school shooting and possibly suicide.’
It emerged last night that police are investigating whether Kozak may have killed a father, 32, and his two-month-old daughter in Klanovice, near Prague. Hundreds of police combed the wooded area after the perpetrator disappeared, and authorities are currently probing whether the two killing sprees could be linked.
Thursday’s massacre is the Czech Republic’s worst ever mass shooting, and the gunman is believed to have been inspired by a school shooting carried out by 14-year-old schoolgirl in Russia earlier this month.
‘I want to do school shooting and possibly suicide, Alina Afanaskina helped me too much,’ he allegedly wrote on December 10 of the Bryansk school shooter, who killed two students before taking her own life.
The chilling post in what the writer called their ‘diary’ about ‘life before the shooting’ went on: ‘I always wanted to kill, I thought I would become a maniac in the future.’
Victims of the attack are evacuated by police officers with some placed on stretchers on Thursday night
A woman cries outside the headquarters of Charles University for the victims of mass shooting in Prague on Friday
Two friends comfort each other during a vigil to honour victims following a shooting at one of Charles University’s buildings in Prague on Friday
People light candles at a makeshift memorial for the victims outside the Charles University in central Prague on Friday
Mourners are overcome with emotion at a vigil for the victims of the mass shooting on Friday
Sickening video has now emerged of Kozak, who was a student at the university, standing on the balcony and aiming his rifle at people below, picking his victims off one by one
He spots victims fleeing and fires two shots in quick succession as the heroic man screams from below
A chilling image shows Kozak dressed in black aiming a rifle at people below while standing on top of a faculty building
A gun recovered by police in Prague which is thought to have been used in the attack
Other extraordinary images show terrified students cowering on a ledge high up on a faculty in a bid to hide from the gunman after others were told to barricade themselves in classrooms
Armed police respond to a shooting at one of the buildings of Charles University on Thursday
An armed police officer takes position near the area of a shooting at one of the buildings of Charles University on Thursday
Police officiers walk around the building of Philosophical Faculty of Charles University where a mass shooting took place on Friday
Distressed members of the public are wrapped in foil as night draws in following the horrific attack
A woman lights a candle in front of the Charles University main building following a shooting at one of the university’s buildings in Prague on Thursday night
Just five days after the disturbing posts appeared online, a father named locally as Martin and baby girl were shot dead in Klanovice, a forest area outside of Prague.
More than 250 police were sent to search the area and a helicopter with thermal imaging was used to scour the woodland area, but the gunman was never found.
At the time, police spokesman Jan Rybanský told iDNES.cz.: ‘The case is being worked on by a team of several dozen of the most experienced criminologists, who were also reinforced by colleagues from the Office of the Criminal Police Service and Investigations of the Police Presidium.’
Horrified friends of Martin said: ‘I remember him as a trainee from the camp and from the tourist section. He was friendly and up for every joke.
‘After school, he focused on himself and started playing a lot of sports. On that occasion he met his future wife.
‘This summer he talked about how happy he is in his life. He said he had a beautiful wife, a child and more on the way. What else could you wish for. He looked happy.
‘Who would do such a thing’.
As investigations into the double murder continue, Czech police now have to assess how a mass killing was able to take place just days later, a half an hour drive away in Prague – and whether the two attacks were both carried out by Kozak.
‘As far as Klanovicky les is concerned, it is not known that the victims were in any way connected to the perpetrator. I am convinced that the victims were completely randomly selected by a person without any criminal history,’ police spokesman Martin Vondráček said on Thursday night.
Vondráček revealed at the press conference: ‘We are working very seriously with the fact that the attacker from the Faculty of Philosophy is also responsible for the two victims from the end of last week in Klanovicky les.’
Horrific scenes unfolded at the historic Charles University campus on Thursday, with pictures showing the gunman dressed in black aiming a rifle at people below while standing on top of the prestigious college’s Faculty of Arts building.
Terrified students and tourists were seen fleeing while others crouched beneath a window ledge on the high building as gunshots rang out in what is one of Europe’s top tourist hotspots. Reports have suggested that one person died after falling from a building as they took cover.
There are fears that tourists could be among those killed or the 25 injured in today’s shooting, with police working to identify the victims and saying they will contact embassies with updates in the event of foreign nationals being affected in the atrocity.
Elite cops were seen storming the philosophy department building of Charles University, where the gunman was a student, with police saying the gunman had been ‘eliminated’ at 4pm – an hour after the deadly carnage began.
Dramatic video shows terrified crowds of tourists and locals sprinting across the famous Charles Bridge – one of Europe’s top tourist sites – after they heard the sickening sound of gunshots in the city
Pictures showed how students and teachers had barricaded themselves into classrooms during the shooting
Police said the gunman’s body had been found in the area and suggested he had taken his own life when cops closed in on him – though cops did say they had fired at him.
‘Due to the devastating injury sustained by the suspect, we are unable to confirm his identity,’ Vondráček said. ‘From the information available to me, there should have been a suicide, however, the police also used a service weapon.’
He added that the death toll could have been much higher: ‘There was a large quantity of ammunition and if the police hadn’t entered the building in time, the perpetrator wouldn’t have been dead on the roof and there would have been a lot more victims.’
Dramatic video showed terrified crowds of tourists and locals sprinting across the famous Charles Bridge – one of Europe’s top tourist sites – after they heard the sickening sound of gunshots in the city.
The gunman fired at his victims one by one from the top of the university building – two hours after he is said to have murdered his father in the town of Hostoun.
In separate footage, people were seen running with their hands raised in the air from the prestigious University’s Faculty of Arts building in the capital, as armed police officers swooped in.
The shooting started at 3pm and police said the gunman was ‘eliminated’ at 4pm after elite cops were seen storming the building. At least 14 people were killed in the shooting and more than 20 were injured – 11 seriously, Prague’s emergency services said.
British tourist Joe Hyland, who was on his first holiday abroad with his group of friends, said they were worried there could have been multiple attackers, and rushed to text their loved ones in case the worst happened.
‘As we got onto the tube and we don’t know how many attackers there are and we don’t know what the attackers are, so it the tube the best place or the worst place to go? So we decided to ring our parents to say we loved them and call our friends,’ he told the BBC.
Speaking from Prague, his friend added: ‘It’s our first holiday as us boys. When something like that happens you call you loved ones because you don’t know in the confusion if you are going to be able to speak to them.’
A British father and daughter also witnessed the chaos unfold. The unnamed man told The Sun: ‘My daughter said, ‘Dad, look up there, there’s a guy on the roof’. And all of a sudden it just went mental, it sounded like a load of firecrackers.
‘I would have said about 30 people got shot. There was a guy lying dead on the right hand side of the square. He was shot in the chest.’
A faculty member of the university, Zora Hesova, said people were locked in classrooms inside the building as armed police officers descended on the scene.
Police later said they killed the gunman after they stormed the building and have evacuated everyone who was trapped inside.
‘The gunman was eliminated!!!’ police said on X, formerly Twitter. ‘The building is currently being evacuated and there are several dead and dozens of wounded people on the scene.’
Extraordinary images show the gunman, who was dressed in black, standing on the roof of the faculty building and pointing his rifle with a scope mounted on top at people down below.
Petr Nedoma, the director of the Rudolfinum – a concert hall on the square across from the Faculty of Arts – told Czech broadcaster CT24: ‘Upstairs on the walkway of the Faculty of Arts, I saw a man standing with a gun in his hand and shooting towards the Mánes bridge with certain delays.
‘I watched what was happening from inside the Rudolfinum for a long time. I stayed in the building and was by the windows for as much cover as possible.’
Nedoma added: ‘Then he put his hands up and threw the gun towards the road, it remained lying by the philosophy faculty. Then a lot of people appeared upstairs, I don’t know if it was the police.
‘I left the window and watched the police evacuate people from the Faculty of Philosophy, taking them away with their hands behind their heads in different directions, a large number of cars, people running around.’
Terrified teachers and students at the Charles University Faculty of Arts were instructed to lock themselves in classrooms before they were evacuated.
Klara, a student, told news site iDnes.cz she was among those who police evacuated from the building.
‘It was terribly scary, there were a lot of policemen everywhere, who were shouting at us with submachine guns, telling us to run outside,’ she said.
An email sent to staff and students at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University had said a shooter was in one of its buildings and had told staff to ‘stay put’.
‘Don’t go anywhere, if you’re in the offices, lock them and place furniture in front of the door, turn off the lights,’ the email said.
One student, Deda Mrazek, said she was in the university’s library when the gunman began shooting at his victims.
Armed police are seen on the balcony of the university in central Prague on Thursday
People can be seen running from a building in Prague
People wrap up as they wait near the building of Philosophical Faculty of Charles University in downtown Prague, Czech Republic
Sharing a picture of students hiding in the back of a computer lab, Deda wrote: ‘I am OK. I was in the library at the time of the shooting.
‘They sent us to the back of the computer lab where there are no windows. Word has now spread that the gunman is dead.’
She said as soon as they heard the gunman had been killed, the terrified students all called their families to say that they were safe.
The police have sealed off the square and the area adjacent to the university building, which is located in a busy part of town that has a popular street leading tourists to Old Town Square
‘According to preliminary information, the shooter himself should be dead, there are dead and wounded on site, I will not speculate now about the final number,’ Interior Minister Vit Rakusan said on Czech Television.
Rakusan added ‘no other gunman has been confirmed’ and called on people to follow police instructions.
Police in the Czech Republic’s capital have urged residents to shelter inside and avoid the area due to the shooting.
President Petr Pavel tweeted: ‘I am shocked by the events at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University.
‘I would like to express my deep regret and sincere condolences to the families and relatives of the victims that the shooting claimed.
‘I want to thank the citizens for respecting the instructions of the security forces and providing maximum cooperation.’
The British Embassy in Prague has urged people in the city, which is popular with tourists, to avoid the around the Charles University and the Faculty of Arts.
Prime Minister Petr Fiala cancelled his trip to the east of the country and was en route to Prague, he said on X.
Gun crime is relatively rare in the Czech Republic. In December 2019, a 42-year-old gunman killed six people at a hospital waiting room in the eastern Czech city of Ostrava before fleeing and fatally shooting himself, police said.
In 2015, a man fatally shot eight people and then killed himself at a restaurant in Uhersky Brod.
