Amrani's all for love

Dubai: The last words Nordine Amrani penned were: "I love you my love. Good luck."

The note accompanied the transfer of all of his money into his wife's bank account.

The last thing to go through Amrani's brain was a bullet fired from his own hand after a bloody gun and grenade attack launched on innocent Christmas shoppers in Liege.

The 33-year-old Belgian of Moroccan descent has premeditatedly left his Liege home with a bag containing grenades, a handgun and a semi-automatic rifle capable of firing 700 rounds a minute.

In his last deeds on earth, Amrani lobbed grenades at people at a busy bus stop, killing three and injuring scores. Hours earlier, at his garden shed which was used to grow marijuana, Amrani had murdered his 45-year-old house cleaner.

He was no stranger to police — in all, he had more than 20 brushes with authorities that had resulted in several jail sentences. On Tuesday, hours before he launched his lone-wolf assault on the innocent shoppers of Liege, Amrani had been summoned to the local police headquarters as part of sexual assault investigation. He never showed up.

Amrani was known to be a habitual drugs user and arms dealer.

He was sentenced to 42 months jail in September 2008 after police discovered enough weapons in his home to start a small war. They found 10 weapons and 9,500 gun parts, and 2,800 cannabis plants. He was paroled in October last year.

"At no moment in any of the judicial proceedings against him was there a sign of unbalance," Daniele Reynders, the public prosecutor of Liege said yesterday.

Along with the body of the cleaner, police also found two weapons and a stockpile of ammunition.

During the 40-month stretch behind bars, there were no clues Amrani had the profile of a sociopath. "He wasn't politicised and he was not diagnosed with any mental disorder," a senior Belgian security official said.

"He wanted to kill as many people as possible," journalist Nicolas Gilenne, who witnessed the attack, said. "I heard four explosions."

A Christmas market was supposed to be taking place in the square. It had been cancelled because of bad weather. Amrani's premeditated plan, however, went according to his twisted deadline.

— With inputs from agencies