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The white man accused of killing 10 people at a Buffalo grocery store on May 14 was charged Wednesday with 25 counts, including domestic terrorism and murder as a hate crime, authorities said.
The grand jury’s indictment came more than two weeks after police said Payton Gendron, 18, traveled to a Tops Friendly Markets store in a Buffalo neighborhood and shot 13 people. they are black. Prior to the attack, researchers say, Gendron had said he subscribed to a racist ideology called the “great substitute” theory.
In a 180-page rambling document shared online, Gendron declared himself a white supremacist, calling his plan terrorism and expressing a desire to incite more violence.
The victims of the Buffalo shooting
After the attack, which he broadcast live, the gunman surrendered, police said, and was charged with first-degree murder. The suspect pleaded not guilty.
Authorities said a grand jury investigation was underway and that the shooting appeared to be a hate crime fueled by racism. Federal authorities are also investigating the shooting as a hate crime and have not filed charges.
A grand jury that considered the case against Gendron returned a charge of domestic terrorism motivated by hatred, 10 charges of first-degree murder as a hate crime, 10 charges of second-degree murder as a crime of hate ‘hate, three second-degree murder charges. as a hate crime and a second-degree criminal possession charge of a weapon.
If convicted of hate-motivated domestic terrorism, Gendron would face an automatic life sentence without parole.
Gendron is scheduled to stand trial on Thursday afternoon. His lawyer, Daniel Dubois, and John Flynn, the Erie County District Attorney, declined to comment before appearing in court.
The shooting shook Buffalo and resonated across the country, the latest in a series of attacks in which officials say the alleged or convicted gunmen were motivated by bigotry. When President Biden spoke in Buffalo three days after the assassinations, he invoked the locations of some of these other massacres, such as El Paso, Pittsburgh and Charleston, SC Ten days after the Buffalo massacre, a gunman fatally shot 19 students and two teachers. a Texas elementary school.
Following the Buffalo shooting, details emerged suggesting extensive planning before Gendron drove about three hours from his home in Conklin, New York, to Buffalo, investigators said. The Washington Post has reviewed hundreds of pages of messages posted online by a writer who identified himself as Gendron, and includes details of plans to kill black people.
These messages also included mentions of the February decision to move to the Tops grocery store in Buffalo due to the strong black population in the community; a March trip to the store to assess its safety; and plans to attack other nearby sites.
Biden attacks fanaticism after Buffalo attack says “white supremacy is poison”
Buffalo police said Gendron was in town in March. They also said investigators believe he planned to continue killing blacks after the grocery store attack.
Gendron kept his family’s plans, he wrote, hoarding weapons and equipment he hid. During the attack, Gendron allegedly carried tactical equipment and wielded an assault weapon that appeared to show racial insult.
Shortly before the shooting, he sent an invitation to Discord users to join a chat room to watch the live stream. Fifteen people accepted the invitation.
Buffalo residents are still staggering after a gunman launched a racial attack at a grocery store, killing 10 people. (Video: Zoeann Murphy / The Washington Post)