The Backstreet Cafe, which caters to a predominantly gay and lesbian crowd, is shown in downtown Roanoke, Va., July 19, 2001, where Ronald Gay shot and killed a man and wounded six others Sept. 22, 2000.

ROANOKE, Va. (AP) - A drifter who told police he was angered by jokes about his last name - Gay - was sentenced Monday to four life terms for a shooting rampage in a gay bar that killed one and left six others wounded.

Ronald E. Gay, 55, told Circuit Judge Clifford Weckstein it would take months to explain the Sept. 22 shooting at the Backstreet Cafe.

"I have a lot of things running through my head," he said.

Gay pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and six malicious wounding charges. In court and in interviews with police, he said he was on a mission to kill homosexuals and was upset over the slang connotation of his last name.

According to witnesses, Gay walked into the bar, ordered a beer and opened fire when he saw Danny Lee Overstreet, 43, and a friend, John Collins, bend to hug each other. He shot both, then turned and wounded the others.

Gay, a Vietnam veteran, told authorities he had become obsessed with fulfilling four ``missions'': To stop corruption, to stop communism, to bring all Vietnam vets ``out of the mountains'' and to make all homosexuals move to San Francisco, which he thought would stop the spread of AIDS.

While Gay has not been found legally insane, defense attorney Roger Dalton said his client heard voices telling him to kill homosexuals.

``Is this an evil person, or is this a sick person?'' Dalton said.

Gay was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder by Veterans Affairs doctors. He was divorced six times and became an alcoholic and a drug abuser.

As early as 1986, Gay had expressed thoughts of violence toward gays. He became convinced that they were trying to destroy society with AIDS, according to court testimony.

Prosecutor Donald Caldwell compared Gay to a hand grenade: ``You can understand what makes it function. But understanding doesn't cancel out the lethality.''

Caldwell brought shooting victims to the stand to show how their injuries continued to control their life.

``I've been through more pain than what some people are able to endure,'' said Page Webb, who showed the judge with her index finger how Gay's bullet entered her temple and rattled around her skull.

The case shocked this blue-collar city of 95,000 at the foot of Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains.

``I don't think four life terms is comparable with what he did to us, but I'm happy that he's going to be away for the rest of his life,'' said Carol Overstreet, Danny Overstreet's sister.

Since the shooting, local activists say residents have been forced to re-examine their feelings about homosexuals. Many in the city's typically hushed gay community have become much more vocal, starting human rights groups and organizing fund-raisers for the shooting victims.