Parker Middle School dance shooting

Wurst showed up late to the dance, with his father's .25-caliber pistol in a holster belt under his jacket. He had previously left a suicide note under his pillow, and stated to investigators that he planned to go to the dance and kill only himself.[5]

The shooting began on an outdoor patio, about twenty minutes before the dance was scheduled to end, around 9:40. He shot John Gillette after he asked Wurst to come inside. Before running out of ammunition, Wurst proceeded to enter Nick's Place, where the dance had been held, and subsequently fired and wounded Edrye Boraten, a teacher and two students, Jacob Tury and Robert Zemcheck.[1] The shooting ended when the owner of Nick's Place, James Strand, intervened and confronted Wurst with his shotgun, ordering him to drop his weapon and later holding him at bay for eleven minutes. Strand later got Wurst on the ground and searched him for weapons, finding a dinner fork in his sock.[6]

Wurst was psychotic. At some points, he seems to have thought that everyone was a zombie, already dead. At other times, he said that he was the only real person in the world, with "unreal" people activated only in his presence. He also claimed he was an alien from another planet, brought to earth as an infant. At school, he sometimes referred to himself as "your god, Satan." He had a number of developmental difficulties, reportedly being a bed-wetter as late as age nine. Even at age fourteen he feared monsters in his closet. At school, he wrote stories and made video accounts of fictional murders and suicide."[7]

His attack was planned; he attempted to recruit another student to help with the massacre. He mentioned his scheme to other students days before the shooting. He took the gun, stuck it in his waistband, and left a suicide note as he left home. At the party, he showed the gun to his classmates, none of whom reported it to an adult."[7]

Wurst's attorneys had considered an insanity defense, but recommended that he plead guilty because it would be hard to convince the jury of an insanity defense.

Wurst was charged with attempted murder, third-degree murder, and first-degree murder, and pleaded guilty in a plea bargain to a lesser charge of third-degree murder along with attempted murder to avoid going to trial, and in an attempt to avoid life imprisonment. He is serving a 30 to 60-year sentence in the State Correctional Institution – Forest. He will be eligible for parole in 2029.