BLACKSBURG, Virginia: Two days after the worst killing spree in modern US history, the shooter again assaulted Virginia Tech - though this time it was in videos and photographs. In the videos, Cho Seung-hui was as garrulous as he was silent in his normal life.

NBC played another round yesterday of the videos Cho mailed to the network in the middle of the killings of 32 people at Virginia Tech. As in the videos released on Wednesday, he repeats himself, again and again, saying the killings could have been prevented and that he was carrying out the shootings for "the weak and defenseless."

"This is it," he says in one video. "This is where it all ends. End of the road. What a life it was. Some life."

On Wednesday, students fell silent, restaurant patrons cringed and mothers turned their children away from the television as NBC aired the first videos of the 23-year-old gunman.

He delivered a snarling, profanity-laced tirade about rich "brats" and their "hedonistic needs."

The barrage of words was in contrast to what students, professors, and even his suitemates said was usually near-complete silence from Cho. They said he would not even speak when people asked questions or tried to draw him out.

"Today" show Matt Lauer said the decision to air the information "was not taken lightly."

Some victims' relatives cancelled their plans to speak with the network "because they were very upset with NBC for airing the images," co-host Meredith Viera said.

NBC said the package contained a rambling and often incoherent 23-page written statement, 28 video clips and 43 photos. Several of the photos showed him aiming handguns at the camera.

The package arrived at NBC headquarters in New York on Tuesday and was opened on Wednesday. It bore a Postal Service time stamp showing that it had been mailed at a Blacksburg post office at 9:01 am on Monday, about an hour and 45 minutes after Cho first opened fire.

"I saw his picture on TV and when I did I just got chills," said Kristy Venning, a third year student at the university. "There's really no words. It shows he put so much thought into this and I think it's sick."

The package helped explain one of the biggest mysteries about the massacre: where the gunman was and what he did during that two-hour window between the first burst of gunfire, at a high-rise dorm, and the second attack, at a classroom building.

"Your Mercedes wasn't enough, you brats," says Cho, a South Korean immigrant whose parents work at a dry cleaners in suburban Washington. "Your golden necklaces weren't enough, you snobs. Your trust funds wasn't enough. Your vodka and cognac wasn't enough. All your debaucheries weren't enough. Those weren't enough to fulfill your hedonistic needs. You had everything."

Earlier in the day, authorities disclosed that more than a year before the massacre, Cho was accused of sending unwanted messages to two women and was taken to a psychiatric hospital on a magistrate's orders. But he was released with orders to undergo outpatient treatment.

The disclosure added to the rapidly growing list of warning signs that appeared well before the student opened fire. Among other things, Cho's twisted, violence-filled writings and sullen, vacant-eyed demeanor had disturbed professors and students so much that he was removed from one English class and was repeatedly urged to get counseling.

Some of the pictures in the video package show him smiling; others show him frowning and snarling. Some depict him brandishing two weapons at a time, one in each hand. He wears a khaki-colored military-style vest, fingerless gloves, a black T-shirt, a backpack and a backward, black baseball cap. Another photo shows him swinging a hammer two-fisted. Another shows an angry-looking Cho holding a gun to his temple.

He refers to "martyrs like Eric and Dylan" a reference to the teenage killers in the Columbine High School massacre in Colorado.

NBC News President Steve Capus said the package arrived in Tuesday afternoon's mail, but was not opened until Wednesday morning. It was sent by overnight delivery and apparently had the wrong postal code, NBC said.

Cho repeatedly suggests he was picked on or otherwise hurt.

"You have vandalized my heart, raped my soul and torched my conscience," he says, apparently reading from his manifesto. "You thought it was one pathetic boy's life you were extinguishing. Thanks to you, I die like Jesus Christ, to inspire generations of the weak and the defenseless people."

Source: China Daily/Agencies