Oregon Shooter Identified As 26-Year-Old Chris Harper Mercer — Here's What We Know

Authorities identified 26-year-old Chris Harper Mercer as the man who opened fire and killed at least nine individuals at an Oregon community college Thursday, according to multiple reports.

A photo posted to a MySpace page belonging to someone identified as Chris Harper Mercer showed a man with a firearm staring into the camera.

The MySpace page contained pro-Irish Republican Army pictures and video. The user shared only two connections on the social-media page. One connection was with Mahmoud Al Ehsani, a man who had several photos of the mujahideen on his profile page.

Image source: MySpace

On a dating profile appearing to belong to the same individual, the 26-year-old identified himself as a "conservative, republican." The man belonged to a "Doesn't Like Organized Religion" group on the dating site and stated twice that he was "not religious." Witnesses say the shooter asked his victims about their religion before opening fire.

Image source: Screen grab

According to the dating profile, he had only been registered on the website for three months.

Gawker uncovered a post kept on a torrent-uploading website that it said seemed to belong to Mercer. In the post, he seemed to identify with the WDBJ-TV shooter.

I have noticed that so many people like him are all alone and unknown, yet when they spill a little blood, the whole world knows who they are. A man who was known by no one, is now known by everyone. His face splashed across every screen, his name across the lips of every person on the planet, all in the course of one day. Seems the more people you kill, the more your’re in the limelight.

Mercer was killed Thursday after a brief gun battle with authorities.

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