Ex-convict Clay Duke, 56, who held the Panama City, Fl.,school board at gunpoint and began randomly firing, had circled the date on a calendar found in his mobile home, evidence he had been planning the attack police told the Associated Press. The shooting at the Bay District board meeting was not “a spur of the moment thing,” said Police Chief John Van Etten. Police found anti-government paraphernalia at Duke’s home. “He was obviously was not happy with our government,” Van Etten said.
Minutes before the shooting, the room had been filled with students accepting awards, but no one was hurt except Duke, who shot himself after exchanging fire with a security guard. He had rambled to the board about tax increases and his wife, who he said had been fired by the school system, and had apparently created a Facebook page last week that refers to class warfare and is laced with images from the movie “V for Vendetta,” in which a mysterious figure battles a totalitarian government.