Kimveer Gill was obsessed with firearms but followed the rules to legally obtain them, gun enthusiasts who knew him say.

Gill, 25,  from Fabreville killed a woman before taking his own life during a shootout with police in the atrium at Montreal's Dawson College on Wednesday. Nineteen other people were injured in the rampage.

Kimveer Gill was carrying three firearms — all legal — when he went on a shooting rampage at Dawson College in Montreal.

Gill was carrying three firearms with him when he entered the college, including a semi-automatic Beretta rifle and a .45-calibre handgun. All three weapons are legal and were registered in his name, Montreal police said.

Investigators have not said which weapon Gill used to shoot himself.

On his website, Gill blogged frequently about his guns, and described firearms as "the great equalizer." He posted many pictures of his weapons, notably a Beretta CX4 Storm rifle.

He also frequented shooting clubs and ranges in Montreal. Sergay Sevunts, an armoured truck driver who belongs to a Montreal gun club, remembered him as a tall man with a calm look, always dressed in combat boots and a dark trench coat.

Sevunts recalled a conversation the two men had when Gill was buying a .45-calibre firearm.

Preference for large-calibre guns

"I say, why you need .45? It's too big. For what purpose?" Sevunts remembered asking Gill. Gill answered that he liked large-calibre guns.

Gill bought firearms from at least two Montreal clubs, including the Club de Tir Ville St-Pierre, where he was a member for about a year. Marco Pendenza, an employee at the club, said he recently sold Gill a 10-shot semi-automatic Glock pistol. 

Gill had passed all government safety tests and qualified for a firearms licence, Pendenza said. Belonging to a gun club doesn't make you a criminal, Pendenza added. "You can't control someone going nuts," he said.

Gill also spent a month in basic training with the Canadian Forces at an army base in St-Jean-sur-Richelieu before dropping out, Radio Canada reported Friday. However, he was not there long enough to receive any weapons training, the report said. 

There are few conditions, other than a criminal record, that would prevent people from owning a firearm, said Raymond Contré, president of the Quebec Shooting Federation. "We were told in the past that mental illness was a factor that would forbid a person to get a firearm," Contré said.

Gun purchases probed

Gill's relationship with guns is pivotal to the investigation into Wednesday's shootings. Montreal police and Quebec provincial police are trying to determine how and where Gill bought the firearms he carried into Dawson College, as well as the stash of ammunition investigators found in his Pontiac Sunfire.

Montreal police said they plan to have a good look at Gill's profile on the website known as vampirefreaks.com, where he had journal entries and 55 photos of himself posing with knives and a rifle, and wearing a trench coat and combat boots.

Police have already seized a computer at Gill's home, and have met with his parents several times.

Investigators continue to meet with eyewitnesses as they stitch together what happened in the first minutes after gunshots were heard at the college over lunchtime on Wednesday.

As of Friday, more than 100 investigators had met with about 300 witnesses, said Montreal police Insp. Paul Chablo.

"We want to finalize why some people saw two suspects, why some people saw three suspects," Chablo said. "Obviously it was the same suspect, but we just want to make sure."

Motive sought

Police want to rule out the possibility that Gill had an accomplice, Chablo said.

 "You can never be sure, in this type of situation, that someone maybe walked in and handed a bag to the shooter," he said, "so we just want to validate our information to make everything totally, totally clear."

Police are still trying to establish a motive. Gill was never a student at Dawson College, nor did he ever apply to study there, said the school's director, Richard Fillion.

Investigators finished collecting forensic evidence from the crime scene at the college late Thursday. The school re-opened to staff on Friday, and students are expected to begin returning on Monday.   

Meanwhile, four people remained in critical condition Friday, according to Montreal General Hospital, where 11 of the shooting victims were treated. Four others were said to be in stable condition, while three have been released.