UCF Gunman: America’s First Would-Be East Indian Mass Killer?

James Oliver Seevakumaran, the troubled student at the University of Central Florida, who was found dead of self-inflicted gunshot wounds in his dormitory room, apparently planned a massacre at the campus that his early demise prevented.

In a statement released to the UCF community, the school’s President John C. Hitt said that Seevakumaran, 30, was a student in the College of Business Administration and was enrolled from the fall semester of 2010 through fall 2012. But he wasn't enrolled in any courses in the spring semester and was “in the process of being removed from UCF housing.”

Seevakumaran was found in his apartment with a handgun, tactical assault rifle and a backpack containing four improvised explosive devices. Police also said he had more than 200 rounds.

But few details of the would-be mass killer’s background have been revealed yet in local media.

According to local police, Seevakumaran was born on Oct. 14, 1982, and his “next of kin” live in Florida. Also, he was arrested on Oct. 30, 2006 in Seminole County by the Florida Highway Patrol, according to arrests.org. But it isn't clear what the charges were and how the case was ultimately disposed of.

WESH-TV in Orlando said Seevakumaran’s roommate was Arabo Babkhani, who described the dead man as a quiet loner. Babkhani also said that he never met any friends or family of Seevakumaran – he reportedly even stayed alone in his dorm during the Thanksgiving holiday.

What can be ascertained about Seevakumaran is that he is likely of partial or full East Indian descent -- Seevakumaran is a name that likely originates in South India.

Had he been able to carry out his deadly plans, he might have become the first East Indian mass killer in U.S. history.

The overwhelming majority of mass murderers in this country have been white males – but there have been some notable exceptions.

In 2007, Seung Hui Cho, a Korean-American male killed 33 people at a mass shooting at the campus of Virginia Tech. In April 2009, a Vietnamese-American named Jiverly Voong killed 13 people at an immigration center in Binghamton, N.Y., before turning the gun on himself.

Earlier this year, in Oakland, Calif., a former nursing student named One Goh, a Korean man, killed seven people at a Korean Christian college.

However, there appear to be no U.S. mass killers whose ancestry hails from the subcontinent.

Canada has had at least one – in September 2006, a Sikh-Canadian man named Kimveer Gill killed one person and wounded another 19 at a shooting spree at Dawson College in Montreal.

Gill, 25, later committed suicide.