Christian Dornier

Christian Dornier (born July 15, 1958) is a French mass murderer who murdered his sister and mother and wounded his father with a 12-gauge double-barrelled shotgun at their farm on July 12, 1989. He then drove through the village of Luxiol and the adjacent area, shooting people at random. A total of fourteen people were killed and eight others injured in Dornier's half-hour rampage, before police managed to subdue him. Dornier was diagnosed with schizophrenia and thus could not be held accountable for his crime according to French law, much to the anger of the victims' families. He has been treated in a psychiatric hospital in Sarreguemines since April 1991. Christian Dornier was born in Baume-les-Dames, the oldest child of Georges and Jeanne Dornier; he had a sister named Corinne and a brother named Serge. Dornier served twelve months in the military around 1981, which apparently negatively affected him. Dornier was described as a reserved person who liked to read and work in the forest. According to his brother he had no friends and hardly talked to anyone, sometimes not talking to anyone in the nearby village of Luxiol for weeks. One and a half years prior to the shooting, Dornier's father decided to retire and hand over the farm to him in three years. Dornier enrolled in a month-long agricultural course to prepare for taking over the farm, but he returned after a week, apparently broken. He shaved his head, began to smoke, abandoned his farm work, and became violent. Eventually Dornier's father decided not to cede the farm to him. Three months prior to the shooting, Dornier, together with his father, bought a Volkswagen Golf GTI because he wanted the choice to leave the farm whenever he wished. In the months prior to the rampage, Dornier fired shots at his father and his neighbour René Barrand, and pelted a woman with stones. The incidents were discussed at the village council, but it was decided that no action was needed since Dornier never had any trouble with the law.