Teen smirks as he is found guilty of Columbine-style massacre plot at UK school
A ‘LONER’ teenager who amassed an arsenal of weapons from the computer in his bedroom has been convicted of planning mass murder.
Liam Lyburd, from Newcastle, told police he was just hours from carrying out a Columbine- style attack at his former college using a Glock semiautomatic handgun and pipe bombs he bought on the ‘dark web’ – websites that can be used anonymously.
Yesterday, he smirked as a jury at Newcastle Crown Court found him guilty of eight charges of possessing weapons with intent to endanger life. As he was led from the dock he put two fingers to his own head in a shooting gesture.
It had been revealed in court that the 19-year-old also planned to kill commuters on Newcastle’s Metro system using weapons he stockpiled in his bedroom. Writing on Facebook he said: ‘I need to engage in homicidal behaviour on a massive scale.’
The Columbine High School massacre in 1999 was carried out by two students who used guns and explosives to kill 12 students and one teacher.
Police who raided Lyburd’s home after being contacted by a worried online friend found a ‘kill bag’ containing overalls, combat boots, a gas mask and gloves, as well as two CS canisters and 94 bullets that expand on impact to cause even greater injury. While on trial, Lyburd boasted that buying the Glock online was ‘like buying a bar of chocolate’. The case has raised disturbing questions about how a teenager
‘Don’t expect me to show mercy’
with few friends and no underworld connections was able to amass such powerful weapons using only the internet.
The Valium-addicted hacker, who smirked throughout the trial and contorted his body in the dock when questioned, told the court he had rarely left his bedroom since being expelled by the college for poor behaviour and attendance. He said he feared leaving the house and lived off takeaway pizzas which he ordered online using money stolen from PayPal accounts.
The teenager sourced weapons from the murky Evolution online marketplace – the dark web’s equivalent of Amazon. He paid using the digital currency Bitcoin, which he obtained by tricking paedophiles into downloading a virus which locked them out of their computers, forcing them to pay Lyburd a ransom to have it removed.
Using pseudonyms including ‘The Joker’ and ‘I Love my Anger’ he had posted a series of chilling messages online, including one which said: ‘I’m going to die along with my friends in school. It’s so sad my life. I’m going to kill my mum and the kids in my school – it’s going to be amazing.’
He said he had been inspired by the shootings carried out in 2011 by Anders Breivik, who murdered 77 people Americanin Norway, Jaylen and Fryberg, 15-year-oldwho killed four high school students last year. In a file that investigators found on his computer, he detailed plans to attack Newcastle College, which had expelled him two years earlier. He said: ‘ You people ruined my whole life, don’t expect me to show mercy today. No one disrespects me and gets away with it.
‘I’ll teach you people a little lesson on respect with my 9mm jacketed hollow points. It’s time for extreme civil disobedience. Fantasy will become reality today for sure. Where the mind goes the body will follow and, yes, people will die, there’s no question about that.’
Lyburd admitted nine counts of possessing weaponry but claimed he was merely an ‘ internet troll’ and his disturbing posts about mass murder were ‘a laugh’ and a cry for attention as he was ‘lonely’.
As Lyburd was arrested at the Newcastle home he shared with his mother and sister in November, he laughed and told officers they had saved lives as he intended to carry out a massacre at his former college that day. Investigators also found webcam pictures that he had sent to women he spoke to online of himself armed and dressed for combat.
Nick Dry, prosecuting, said: ‘This was no improbable fantasy of a naive daydreamer divorced from reality but a carefully planned revenge attack, constructed and resourced by an embittered yet highly skilled and savvy computer hacker. At the same time, he was constructing viable explosive devices and identifying himself with those responsible for recent mass killings around the world.’
Lyburd was remanded in custody to await sentencing in September. Judge Paul Sloan QC told him: ‘You will appreciate only a very substantial sentence is appropriate in the circumstances of this case.’