Ryszard C. being taken into custody. Photo: PAP/Rafał GołyRyszard C., a taxi driver who shot a political assistant and stabbed another at Law and Justice party headquarters in Lodz, has spoken out about his terminal illness and personal history leading to Tuesday’s crazed murder.
“I have cancer, and have only seven months to live,” Ryszard C. told police officers, as quoted by the daily Gazeta Wyborcza, adding that he has sold his house, handed in his taxi licence and written a will in which he passes on everything to his divorced wife.
During the Polish People’s Republic, Ryszard C. worked as an illegal hard currency exchanger [Polish cinkciarz], as well as being a communist police informer. After the collapse of communism, he emigrated to Canada, and became a taxi driver only after he returned to Poland around the year 2000.
Wanted to kill “any politician, from any party”
It has transpired that Ryszard C. was planning the murder for a year, and was not necessarily aiming for Law and Justice leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski, rather wanting to kill “any politician, from any party, so that they would not be so self-confident.”
According to Gazeta Wyborcza, Ryszard C. had earlier tried to kill former Prime Minister Leszek Miller “but it didn’t work out,” the taxi driver told his jailers.
Jaroslaw Kaczynski targeted?
The taxi driver was travelling around Poland since July in order to plot his attack on the Law and Justice office.
“We are going to check where he was, if assistants at other Law and Justice offices remember him, as well as check other party offices in other towns, and whether [Ryszard C.] came near Nowogrodzka street in Warsaw [where the national HQ of Law and Justice is located,” a high-ranking bureaucrat at the Prime Minister’s Chancellery told the daily.
Police and special services are trying to ascertain whether Ryszard C. had tried to plan an attack on the opposition leader, a move which was prompted by the murderer’s words upon arrest: “I wanted to kill Kaczynski, but my gun was too small.”
Earlier stakeout…hit list?
According to the daily Polska The Times, Ryszard C. visited the Law and Justice offices in Lodz a day before he committed the crime. He spoke with Law and Justice MEP Janusz Wojciechowski’s assistant, who he murdered the next day, and obtained a list of party candidates standing for the Lodz local council elections.
The list was found on Ryszard C. when taken into custody, along with a box containing 49 rounds of ammunition for a Walther pistol.
Investigators have also discerned that Ryszard C. had been in Lodz since the 13 October, first staying in a room at the city’s Savoy hotel, and then moving to the Centrum hotel, from where he left at 10.00 CET on Tuesday for the Law and Justice office.
Police have secured a Renault hire car, as well as Ryszard C.’s personal belongings from the hotel room, including a laptop, clothes and a Canadian passport. (jb/pg)