Video Game Obsession Leads Teen to Murder Family, Plan School Attack

Image: @CrimeLdn

Nicholas Prosper, a 19-year-old from Luton, UK, was sentenced to life in prison after killing his family members in September 2024. The court heard that Prosper had developed a dangerous obsession with a fictional video game character that led to violence.

On March 19, Prosper appeared in Luton Crown Court where he admitted to murdering his mother Juliana Falcon, his sister Giselle Prosper, and his younger brother Kyle Prosper at their home. He received a life sentence with a minimum term of 49 years before being eligible for parole.

The court learned that Prosper's crimes were motivated by an unhealthy fixation with Clementine, a character from Telltale's The Walking Dead video game series. In a video posted online after the murders, Prosper declared: "I am the chosen one; chosen by Clementine. I am guided as Christians are guided by Jesus Christ." This character first appeared in the games in 2012 as a young child who grows into a survivor in the game's post-apocalyptic world.

According to BBC reports, Prosper even told a prison nurse that his ultimate goal was to "go to Clementine and join her in death" after completing his planned attacks.

The teenager's deadly plan didn't stop with his family. Police discovered that Prosper had carefully planned to attack St. Joseph's Catholic Primary School, his former elementary school. He intended to target young children aged four and five while wearing a distinctive yellow outfit and carrying a 12-bore Japanese Nikko shotgun he had illegally obtained.

Timothy Cray KC, the prosecutor, told the court that Prosper wanted to "be remembered amongst the ranks of other notorious killers" and aimed to kill more victims than were killed in the Sandy Hook school shooting in America. Investigators found evidence that Prosper had researched previous mass shootings and intended to kill as many as 30 children before taking his own life.

The court heard that Prosper had made elaborate preparations for his attack. In August 2023, he joined a gun-selling website and began researching how to produce fake firearm certificates. By July 2024, he had focused his attention on his former school, creating detailed plans of the classrooms with notes indicating his intentions to "kill all" in the early years' classroom.

On August 31, Prosper successfully purchased a shotgun for £600 from a seller he met in the parking lot of his apartment building. He used a forged shotgun certificate and pretended to be interested in clay pigeon shooting to convince the seller it was a legitimate sale.

His family seems to have realized something was wrong on the morning of September 13, the day Prosper planned to carry out his school attack. When they confronted him, he turned the weapon on them instead. The prosecutor noted that this family intervention, though resulting in their deaths, "almost certainly saved the lives of many children."

Police arrested Prosper within two hours of the murders, preventing what could have been a much larger tragedy. CCTV footage showed him leaving his apartment with the gun at 5:33 am and hiding it in nearby bushes along with 33 cartridges. At around 7:55 am, two police officers spotted him standing on the pavement with his arm extended in the air.

Dr. Iain Kooyman, a consultant forensic psychiatrist who assessed Prosper, testified that the teen had undiagnosed autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, he noted that Prosper's "extreme lack of empathy with others and an extreme lack of remorse" could not be explained by ASD alone.

The defense suggested that Prosper had fallen into an internet "wormhole" that severely damaged his psychological state. Before his arrest, Prosper had been banned from a website that glorified gore because of his disturbing views on child abuse, pedophilia, and necrophilia.

The prosecutor emphasized that Prosper "had been preparing these killings for months. His planning was cold, deliberate and without sympathy or emotion towards the actual victims or potential victims."

This case highlights the dangerous potential of extreme online content and untreated mental health issues.

Source: BBC News