A 29-year-old man attacked three school children and a parent with a vegetable knife killing two and wounding two others Thursday morning in Shanghai, local police said in a statement.

The fatalities from the elementary school in the Xuhui district died in a hospital while the injured child and parent did not suffer life-threatening wounds, according to police.

The attacker, who was detained at the scene, was unemployed and angry at society, Shanghai police said.

Earlier in April, a 28-year-old man who despised children because he had been bullied at school stabbed to death seven Chinese middle school students who were on their way from classes in the northwestern province of Shaanxi.

Violent crimes are often blamed on people with mental illness or who have personal grievances. Sputnik