Behaviour patterns of persons who commit armed attacks on educational institutions

Introduction. The regularities in behaviour of persons who commit mass killings in educational institutions are revealed to develop a program for the prevention of this kind of crimes. Materials and Methods. 107 cases of mass shootings in educational institutions ("schoolshooting") in Russia, the USA, Canada, Germany and Finland were considered via case-study method. Each case was analyzed according to six criteria of identifying geographical, temporal and moon-phase dependencies. Results and Discussion. A statistically reliable relationship between the time of armed attacks on educational institutions and the phases of the lunar cycle was revealed. The author establishes the dangerous period, which covers three days before and three days after the "crucial" points of the lunar cycle - full moon or new moon; it is stated that the most frequent attacks on educational institutions are committed during the growing Moon, on the second day of the new moon. Conclusions. The proven absence of geographical and calendar bindings of excesses of "schoolshooting" indicates the absence of organizational structures and coordination centers for this destructive phenomenon. Against the background of failed attempts to build a system of early revealing of such crimes solely on the basis of drawing up individual psychological portraits of "school shooters", it is necessary to develop a different, objective system to identify patterns that determine their behavior, an element of which can be connected with the phases of the lunar cycle.