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He said the motive for the killings was unclear.

Media reports said the suspect had a license for the handgun. Although such shootings are relatively rare in Serbia, weapons are readily available, mostly from the 1990s wars in the Balkans.

Residents said the man first killed his son before leaving the house and then began shooting his neighbors. They expressed shock, describing the suspect as a nice quiet man.

“He knocked on the doors and as they were opened he just fired a shot,” said resident Radovan Radosavljevic. “He was a good neighbor and anyone would open their doors to him. I don’t know what happened.”

Neighbors said an entire five-member family was shot dead in one house, including the small boy who was the suspected killer’s cousin.

Milovan Kostadinovic, another neighbor, said the suspect was caught by police while on the way to his house.

“If they didn’t stop him, he would have wiped us all out,” Kostadinovic said, standing in front of his two-story, red tile- roofed house — one of a dozen modest homes that make up the village, located on a lush green hill covered with fruit trees. “He shot himself when police stopped him.”

The suspect had lost his job last year and fought as a Serb soldier in the war in Croatia in 1992, the police chief said. Villagers said Bogdanovic fought in Vukovar, the eastern Croatian town that was destroyed in a massive Serbian-led army offensive — the scene of the worst bloodshed during Croatia’s 1991-95 war for independence.