US: Buffalo shooter sought African Americans, officials say

An 18-year-old gunman who is accused of killing 10 people and injuring three others in a mass shooting in the US had looked for places with a high concentration of Black residents prior to committing the crime, authorities said on Sunday.

Payton G.* surrendered to police on Saturday at the Buffalo, New York, store after an attack the FBI said would be investigated both as a hate crime and as an act of "racially motivated violent extremism" under federal law. Eleven of the 13 people shot were Black.

"This individual came here with the express purpose of taking as many Black lives as he could,'' Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown said at a news conference.

The man drove to Buffalo from Conklin using an assault weapon to launch the attack at Tops Friendly Markets, which he broadcast in real-time on Twitch. The social media platform said it removed the stream after less than two minutes.

"The evidence that we have uncovered so far makes no mistake, this is an absolute racist hate crime that will be prosecuted as a hate crime," Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia said.

Gramaglia said Payton G. had been in town "at least the day before,'' adding "It seems that he had come here to scope out the area, to do a little reconnaissance work on the area before he carried out his just evil, sickening act." 

Federal authorities were still working to confirm the authenticity of a 180-page racist manifesto the suspect apparently posted online outlining his racist, anti-immigrant and antisemitic beliefs.

Suspect investigated in past for alleged threatening statement

New York State Police said they were called to the Conklin school in June last year after a student had made threatening statements. They did not identify the student but said he was taken into custody under a state mental health law and taken to a hospital for an evaluation.

A law enforcement official speaking on condition of anonymity told the AP news agency it was Payton G., and he had threatened a shooting at Susquehanna High School.

New York Governor Kathy Hochul said the investigation into the massacre would focus on how he managed to get away with it when he was known to authorities and presented a threat.

Federal agents interviewed his parents and served multiple search warrants. They were said to be cooperating with investigators.

Payton G. was charged with first-degree murder, and he pleaded not guilty in court Saturday night. More charges were expected at his next scheduled court appearance on May 19.

Who are the victims?

The Buffalo attack was the deadliest US mass shooting of the year. Among the dead was security guard Aaron Salter, a retired Buffalo police officer, who fired multiple shots at the gunman. Also killed was Ruth Whitfield, 86, the mother of retired Buffalo Fire Commissioner Garnell Whitfield.

Mayor Brown told True Bethel Baptist Church worshipers that he saw the former fire official at the shooting scene Saturday, looking for his mother.

"My mother had just gone to see my father, as she does every day, in the nursing home and stopped at the Tops to buy just a few groceries. And nobody has heard from her,'' Whitfield told the mayor then.

Police have not released the names of most of the victims.

US President Joe Biden decried the shooting as "abhorrent to the very fabric of this nation" in a statement on Saturday.

*Editor's note: DW follows the German press code, which stresses the importance of protecting the privacy of suspected criminals or victims and urges us to refrain from revealing full names in such cases.

lo/jcg (AP, Reuters)