The Metro newspaper ran the headline: ‘Sailor’s ‘GTA gun spree’ on nuke sub’. The Royal Navy sailor shot dead one Lt Cmdr and seriously wounded another.
According to the newspaper the disturbed sailor told friends he was going on a ”Grand Theft Auto-style massacre” before boarding HMS Astute and killing Lt Cmdr Ian Molyneux at point blank with a SA80 assault rifle, and wounded Lt Cmdr Christopher Hodge.
He also shot at two petty officers who dodged the gunfire and was tackled and disarmed by Southampton city council leader Royston Smith and chief executive Andrew Neill. The HMS Astute is a British nuclear submarine. The killer has been sentenced to 25 years.
”He started talking about the video game Grand Theft Auto where you start a massacre and rack up points by killing,” prosecutor Nigel Lickley told the court. This certainly isn’t the first time the GTA series has been blamed for providing a ‘killing simulator’.
Many attempt to link the GTA videogames to real world violence and some even try legal action against publisher Take-Two. Has anyone actually tried to carry the arsenal of weapons Niko has with the clothes he wears without being discovered?
Then there’s the fact that GTA characters can carry an ungodly amount of ammo, can reload weaponry on the fly and even auto lock targets. Exactly what part of Grand Theft Auto is a simulator for killing people in the real world? GTA 3 didn’t even have scope sway.
