In what officials termed as “racially motivated violent extremism,” a white 18-year-old wearing military gear and live streaming with a helmet camera opened fire with a rifle at a supermarket in Buffalo on Saturday, killing 10 people and wounding three others.
In a spree he streamed live on the streaming site Twitch, police said he shot 11 black and two white victims before surrendering to authorities.
He was later arraigned on a murder charge in a paper medical gown before a judge.
“I sincerely hope that this man, this white supremacist who just committed a hate crime against an innocent community, spends the rest of his life in prison.” “And may God help him in the next world as well,” Governor Kathy Hochul remarked near the attack site.
The shooting sent shockwaves across a country riven by racial tensions, gun violence, and a wave of hate crimes. Dallas police reported the day before the shooting that they were investigating a spate of shootings in Korea town as hate crimes. The Buffalo attack occurred exactly one month after ten people were injured in a mass shooting on a Brooklyn subway train.
Payton Gendron, of Conklin, New York, roughly 200 miles (320 kilometers) southeast of Buffalo, was identified as the alleged gunman in Saturday’s attack on Tops Friendly Market.
Payton’s trip to Buffalo and that particular grocery store was not immediately evident. Gendron was seen arriving at the supermarket in his car in a clip from his Twitch feed that was shared on social media.
According to Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia, the gunman shot four persons outside the store, three of whom died. Security guard Aaron Salter, a retired Buffalo police officer, fired multiple shots inside the establishment. According to Gramaglia, a bullet struck the gunman’s bulletproof gear but had no effect.
According to the commissioner, the gunman then killed the guard before stalking through the store and shooting other people.
The gunman was challenged by police in the vestibule of the store. He put his weapon to his own neck, but two cops persuaded him to put it down, according to Gramaglia.
At the news conference, Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown remarked, “This is the worst nightmare that any town can suffer, and we are hurting and fuming right now.” “The kind of pain that families and all of us are experiencing right now cannot possibly be described.”
Twitch said in a statement that Gendron’s broadcast was cut off “less than two minutes after the violence began.”
Investigators were checking into whether he had released a manifesto online, according to a law enforcement officer. The official was not allowed to speak publicly about the situation and had to do so under the condition of anonymity.
Police in Buffalo declined to comment on a letter that claimed to explain the attacker’s racist, anti-immigrant, and anti-Semitic convictions, including a wish to exclude all individuals, not of European origin from the United States.
According to the report, he was inspired by the gunman who massacred 51 people in two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, in 2019.
Sheriff John Garcia of Erie County termed the shooting a hate crime during an earlier press conference.
“This was heinous. It was a racially motivated hate crime perpetrated by someone from outside our community, the City of Good Neighbors, who came into our neighborhood and tried to inflict that evil on us,” Garcia added.
Ruth Whitfield, the 86-year-old mother of a retired Buffalo fire commissioner, was one of the victims.
“My mother was a mother to those who had no mother. Former Fire Commissioner Garnell Whitfield told the Buffalo News, “She was a blessing to all of us.”
Braedyn Kephart and Shane Hill, both 20, were witnesses who pulled into the parking lot just as the shooter was exiting.
“With the rifle to his chin, he stood there.” What the hell was going on, we wondered. Why is this youngster holding a gun to his head?” According to Kephart. He got down on his knees. “He pulled off his helmet, dropped his rifle, and cops tackled him.”
Officials claimed Gendron’s gun was properly purchased, but the magazines he used for ammo were not permitted to be sold in New York.
In a statement, President Joe Biden said he and First Lady were praying for the victims and their families.
“While law enforcement continues to investigate the motive for today’s shooting, we don’t need anything more to convey a simple moral truth: a racially motivated hate crime is repulsive to the fundamental fabric of this country,” he added. “Any act of domestic terrorism, particularly one committed in the name of a vile white supremacist ideology, is diametrically opposed to everything America stands for.”
“We are stunned and very saddened by this terrible act of violence,” Tops Friendly Markets said in a statement. “Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their families.”
The shooting occurred just over a year after a ten-person attack at a King Soopers grocery store in Boulder, Colorado, in March 2021. Investigators have not said why they believe the man involved in the attack chose the shop as his target.
The shooting in Buffalo, according to NAACP President Derrick Johnson, was “extremely terrible.”
He stated, “Hate and racism have no place in America.”
The Rev. Al Sharpton has asked the White House to hold a conference with Black, Jewish, and Asian leaders to show the federal government’s commitment to fighting hate crimes.
Erica Pugh-Mathews was waiting outside the store, behind police tape, more than two hours after the shooting.
“We’d like to know how my aunt, my mother’s sister, is doing.” She was there with her fiancé, but they split out and went to different aisles,” she explained. “A bullet only grazed him. He was able to hide in a freezer, but he was unable to reach my aunt and is unaware of her whereabouts. We just want to know if she’s all right.”
