The American Spectator

A gunman who opened fire during a Florida school board meeting before apparently committing suicide left a “testament” on his Facebook page that blamed the “wealthy” for his crime.

Clay Duke, 56, pulled a pistol during a Tuesday school board meeting in Panama City, Fla., and fired several shots, according to press accounts. A security officer for the school system shot and wounded Duke, who then fatally shot himself, police told reporters.

Before pulling the gun, Duke used a can of red spray-paint to make the letter “V” inside a circle on a wall of the meeting room. This was evidently a reference to the 2006 movie V for Vendetta, in which a character uses terrorist tactics to fight an oppressive government. While holding board members and the superintendent at gunpoint, Duke complained that his wife had been fired by the school system.

According to ABC News and other sources, state records show Duke had a criminal record, having served a four-year prison term for aggravated stalking and other charges.

On his Facebook profile, Duke left a diatribe portraying himself as the victim of an unfair system:

Some people (the government sponsored media) will say I was evil, a monster (V)… no… I was just born poor in a country where the Wealthy manipulate, use, abuse, and economically enslave 95% of the population. Rich Republicans, Rich Democrats… same-same… rich… they take turns fleecing us… our few dollars… pyramiding the wealth for themselves. The 95%… the us, in US of A, are the neo slaves of the Global South. Our Masters, the Wealthy, do, as they like to us…

Duke’s Facebook page quoted a statement that investor Warren Buffett recently made to Ben Stein: “There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.” On his Facebook page, Duke also described his religion as “humanist” and referred visitors to the Web site, The Progressive Mind.