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Unfortunately, this is America.
Yet another preventable act of white supremacist gun violence has shaken the nation. The AP reports that on Saturday, an 18-year-old gunman opened fire on a predominantly Black crowd of shoppers at Tops Friendly Market in Buffalo, New York. The pre-meditated and meticulously planned attack left 10 dead and three others wounded. Of the 13 people shot, 11 victims are Black. Based on the shooter’s own words and digital footprint online, the devastating hate crime was intended to target and terrify Black communities specifically.
“This was pure evil. Straight up racially motivated, hate crime from somebody outside of our community — outside of the City of Good Neighbors, as the mayor said — coming into our community and trying to inflict evil upon us” said Erie County Sheriff John Garcia during a news conference.
The white nationalist killer arrived at the grocery store Saturday afternoon dressed in tactical gear and armed with a high-powered rifle. He opened fire in the parking lot, where he fatally shot three people and wounded another before entering the store. A Black security guard and former Buffalo police officer named Aaron Salter Jr. bravely returned fire but did not survive a shootout because only the domestic terrorist had bulletproof armor. Other known victims include 77-year-old Pearly Young and 86-year-old Ruth Whitfield.
#RIP Retired Buffalo PD Officer #AaronSalter who lost his life while heroically saving others today during a deadly mass shooting at Tops on Jefferson Ave. in #Buffalo. May all of the victims and their loved ones be held in comfort and strength ❤️https://t.co/7E0BV1Dy7Z pic.twitter.com/BilxFi4btf
— Alex Lynne (@alexlovesfreddy) May 15, 2022
Pearly Young, 77, was killed today in #Buffalo shopping for groceries.
For 25 years she ran a pantry where every Saturday she fed people in Central Park. Every. Saturday.
She loved singing, dancing, & being with family.She was mother, grandma, & missionary. Gone too soon 🕊 pic.twitter.com/dQ5X9KBJCQ
— Madison Carter (@madisonlcarter) May 15, 2022
This morning, we're focusing on the victims.
This is Ruth Whitfield.
She was 86 and was the mother of former Buffalo Fire Commissioner Garnell Whitfield. pic.twitter.com/kaV1r7xPtx
— Mel Orlins (@Mel_Orlins) May 15, 2022
Officials confirmed that the teen live-streamed the carnage on Twitch, which removed the feed “less than two minutes after the violence started,” according to a spokesperson for the platform. Similar to other racist mass murderers, he allegedly wrote that he was radicalized in extremist communities online and justified the mass shooting with the same anti-Black and anti-immigrant rhetoric regularly featured on conservative platforms like Fox News. Fear-mongering propaganda about minorities replacing the white population is a commonly held belief for those who are also violent against Muslim, Latinx, and Jewish people.
No @MSNBC…white-supremacist terrorists aren’t just inspired by Hitler, Nazis & evildoers of the past.
They’re also fueled by Tucker Carlson, Ben Shapiro, Donald Trump, Sam Alito, Ron Desantis…#BuffaloNY— Melina Abdullah (@DocMellyMel) May 15, 2022
Hmm pic.twitter.com/XFdzYzQzwz
— The Daily Show (@TheDailyShow) May 15, 2022
The dangerous and delusional published writing indicates that every detail of this tragedy was planned out well in advance to cause the most racist terror. Less than 24 hours after the incident, one of Google’s most popular searches is the distance from little-known Conklin, New York to Buffalo because the killer spent at least three hours traveling to this particular grocery store more than 200 miles from his home. He reportedly targeted planned to target a predominantly Black community where gun laws were too strict for victims to challenge his firepower. The brief and horrifically graphic video that was broadcast online showed that he wrote both “n***er” and a Nazi reference on the barrel of the assault weapon.
The security guard was a retired officer and shot at the suspect but the suspect was wearing body armor. The suspect engaged the retired officer and the officer was shot and deceased pic.twitter.com/1MYxNRGzr8
— Acyn (@Acyn) May 14, 2022
The Buffalo shooter said in his manifesto that, in addition to targeting the area for its Black population, he researched the days and times when the Tops grocery store was busiest.
The neighborhood is a food desert, and shaped by decades of segregationhttps://t.co/fW0XpYSrAL
— philip lewis (@Phil_Lewis_) May 15, 2022
Somehow the boys in blue took the well-armed mass murderer into custody alive after they talked him down in a standoff. It’s amazing how gently he was embraced by police in a city that does not keep that same energy at protests against police violence. Buffalo police are already notorious for their reckless brutality. A viral video from a 2020 George Floyd protest showed two Buffalo cops in riot gear, officers Robert McCabe and Aaron Torgalski, shove a 75-year-old White man named Martin Gugino so hard that he cracked his skull on the concrete and suffered a brain injury. Both officers were cleared of any wrongdoing on April 8, 2022.
We see how the Buffalo police that violently attacked peaceful demonstrators during BLM in 2020 gently held up a white supremacist mass murderer today. pic.twitter.com/G99hZrxFdA
— Amy Shefrin (@AmyShefrin) May 14, 2022
Thinking about the fact that the Buffalo shooter put a gun to his chin, set it down, took off his body armor, then put his hands up, and was arrested alive.
Patrick Lyoya was pulled over for a plate issue, was shot point blank in the head, and everyone forgot about it in a day.
— Elizabeth C. McLaughlin (she/her) (@ECMcLaughlin) May 15, 2022
The killer pled not guilty to the multiple counts of first-degree murder at an arraignment Saturday night. The Buffalo district attorney’s office plans to file additional charges against him according to CNN. The FBI is also “investigating the shooting as both a hate crime and a case of racially motivated violent extremism,” according to said FBI special agent Stephen Belongia.
Our deepest condolences go out to the victims, their loved ones, and everyone affected by this horrible tragedy.
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