An upstate gun-store owner said Sunday he recently sold an assault weapon to accused Buffalo shooter Payton Gendron — and that he “feels terrible” about the teen’s alleged crime.
Robert Donald of Vintage Firearms in Endicott, NY, told The New York Times he learned from federal agents Saturday night that he had recently sold the 18-year-old suspect a Bushmaster assault weapon.
“I knew nothing about it until I got the call from them,” Donald told the outlet. “I couldn’t believe it.”
Gendron previously said in a race-hating manifesto that he planned to use a Bushmaster XM-15 in his assault, which ended up killing 10 people at a supermarket Saturday.
Donald said he didn’t recall specifics about his gun sale to Gendron because of the volume of customers he serves but that two agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives came to his store at 7:30 p.m. to gather paperwork related to the purchase.
The shop’s background check on Gendron had not turned up any red flags, Donald said.
“He didn’t stand out,” he said of the teen. “Because if he did, I would’ve never sold him the gun.
“I don’t understand why an 18-year-old would even do this,” Donald said. “I know I didn’t do anything wrong, but I feel terrible about it.”
Donald said he rarely sells the type of assault rifle sought by Gendron and instead specializes in vintage pistols.
Gendron previously said in a race-hating manifesto that he planned to use a Bushmaster XM-15 in his assaultErie County DAAn upstate gun-store owner revealed Sunday he recently sold an assault weapon to accused Buffalo shooter Payton Gendron.Google Maps
Gendron reportedly modified the firearm to make it more lethal. Donald said the weapon was legally compliant when sold.
“Even with all of those safety features on it — which is the only way I sell it — any gun can be easily modified if you really want to do it,” the gun-shop owner said.
Gendron is accused of targeting black customers after traveling to Buffalo to carry out the shooting.
After a teen was shot and killed near The Bean, Mayor Lori Lightfoot has banned unaccompanied minors from visiting Millennium Park after 6 p.m. from Thursday through Sunday, a policy aimed at keeping large crowds of teenagers from creating chaos, but one that has inspired criticism from civil libertarians.
The move is reminiscent of Lightfoot’s decision throughout 2020 to raise bridges downtown as a way to keep potential looters or other criminals out of the Loop. That decision provoked fierce criticism from residents who said the city was making downtown inhospitable to Black and brown residents from the South and West Side, though Lightfoot defended the bridge raising as necessary to prevent civil unrest.
“Tragically, a young person — a teenager — lost his life last night in Millennium Park. I suspect an overwhelming majority of the youth who were in the Park were there to have a good time and enjoy a summer evening. But the scene devolved into one of chaos and unnecessary violence,” Lightfoot, who spent much of the past week in Texas, said in a statement. “We, as a City, can not allow any of our public spaces to become platforms for danger. Anyone coming into our public spaces should expect to enjoy them peacefully and must respect and exhibit basic community norms of decency. We simply will not accept anything less.”
It’s not clear what legal power Lightfoot is relying on to implement the new policy, and her office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Chicago police monitor the movements of groups of young people in downtown Chicago after a teenage boy was shot and fatally wounded near the sculpture Cloud Gate in Millennium Park and the area erupted in disturbances on May 14, 2022. (Terrence Antonio James / Chicago Tribune)
The teenager who was fatally shot during an “altercation” at The Bean on Saturday night was identified Sunday as Seandell Holliday, who lived on West 112th Place in the Roseland neighborhood, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office. Police announced that two people, including a 17-year-old boy believed to be the shooter, were detained in the park shortly after the shooting, according to a police report.
On Sunday afternoon, Chicago police Superintendent David Brown and several other officials announced the city’s plan. “I want to encourage young people and their parents to enjoy downtown but with adult supervision,” he said during a news conference, standing with police brass and city officials.
“This new policy will be strictly enforced and violations will be dealt with swiftly,” Ann Hickey, a deputy commissioner of operations for the city’s Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events warned.
Chicago Public School officials said they planned to send parents a communication on Monday reminding them of summer programs for young people across the city. CPS officials also planned to start “positive” conversations with students, principals and parents about safety, adding that Local School Councils would be included, said Jadine Chou, CPS’ chief safety and security officer.
Brown pointed responsibility for the large crowds at unnamed social media posts telling teens to come downtown. Social media posts were also responsible for large crowds at North Avenue Beach that flowed into neighborhood streets, as well as a gathering in Jackson Park last week that ended in a shooting. At least 26 juveniles and five adults were arrested during Saturday’s commotion and eight guns were recovered, police said.
“We’re not sure if (the gatherings are) for nefarious reasons, or just a gathering point for a lot of young people,” Brown said.
Chicago Police superintendent David Brown attends a press conference on May 15, 2022, at CPD headquarters the day after a 16-year-old boy was fatally shot near the Bean as large crowds of teenagers occupied the area. (Armando L. Sanchez / Chicago Tribune)
Brown tried to walk a line, saying agencies wanted to partner with parents not blame them directly for the violence.
“This is not a ‘point a finger at a parent and saying you’re a bad parent.’ This is a challenging time to be a parent,” Brown said before adding he understood what drove teens out into the streets on warm nights.
“This is a challenging time for young people dealing with the pandemic that’s happening at schools. The shutdown. They want to get out like most adults do. It’s just for younger people, they don’t understand how quickly things can happen and how to resolve conflicts without ending up in violence.”
The ban on unaccompanied teens comes at a sensitive time for the city and for the mayor. Downtown Chicago still hasn’t fully recovered from the economic turmoil unleashed by COVID-19 or two rounds of looting in the summer of 2020 and it has experienced surging crime that has concerned the business community, residents and City Hall. Lightfoot, who is widely expected to seek reelection, has been under pressure to address city violence and mayhem that spiked dramatically in 2020 and remains high.
Edwin C. Yohnka, the director of communications and public policy for the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois, said the ban suggests the park should not be available to all Chicago residents.
People hang out at the Cloud Gate sculpture in Millennium Park on May 15, 2022, in Chicago. After a 16-year-old was shot and killed near the Bean on Saturday night, Mayor Lori Lightfoot has banned unaccompanied minors from visiting Millennium Park after 6 p.m. from Thursday through Sunday. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)
“The vague description — relying on an undefined ‘responsible adult’ — allowing young people to be present in the park and the promise of strict enforcement will result in unnecessary stops and arrests and further strain relations between CPD and young people of color,” Yohnka said.
On Sunday, hundreds of people, most of them families with young children and tourists, snapped photos in Millennium Park under a threatening sky and light drizzle, most unaware of the large police presence a day prior.
Sculptor Anish Kapoor created The Bean, 201 E. Randolph St., which is the nickname of the sculpture — officially known as Cloud Gate. It was dedicated at the park on May 15, 2006.
Saturday’s shooting didn’t deter Yasmin El-Tigani and her husband, Adam Sadkowski, from visiting the iconic art installation with their two children and their Goldendoodle Nilee, though it did keep them on higher alert.
“It bothers me because it’s supposed to be a safe place,” El-Tigani said as her daughter, Alya, 10, and son Zaiden played with their dog against the sculpture. “You have to worry about your family, your kids and make sure you’re not in danger.”
The couple brought their children downtown so they could participate in the Hustle Chicago stair-climbing event at Soldier Field and celebrate El-Tigani’s 39th birthday. Residents of west suburban Lisle, the couple said they had only traveled to the city twice this year.
“(The violence) stays at the back of your mind,” said Sadkowski, 49. “The crime appears to be affecting crime in neighborhoods that were safer in the past. That’s our thought process.”
Visiting from the western suburbs, 10-year-old Alya El-Tigani hangs out with her family at the Cloud Gate sculpture in Millennium Park on May 15, 2022, in Chicago. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)
Saturday’s shooting happened about 7:30 p.m. in the 200 block of East Randolph Street. Around the same time, police were responding “in the area of downtown and Millennium Park” to what they deemed a large crowd “disturbance” — which led to the arrest of dozens of juveniles, two injured police officers and seven recovered guns. Two of those guns were in the possession of the two people who were still being questioned by detectives Sunday afternoon in connection with the homicide at The Bean.
The teen was shot at least once in the chest and paramedics rushed him to Lurie Children’s Hospital, initially in critical condition, according to Larry Merritt, a Fire Department spokesman. He was pronounced dead at the hospital at 8:12 p.m., according to police and the medical examiner’s office.
It wasn’t clear how many of the hundreds of teenagers estimated to be involved in the downtown disturbance were nearby when the shooting occurred, and a police representative declined to answer questions about the correlation and overlap between the fatal shooting and the disturbance in the same area at the same time.
But the police report suggests Holliday and the shooter were among a group of teens. The report, citing police and Park District video surveillance that captured the shooting, said: “The victim, along with numerous other individuals, appear to be in an altercation with the (17-year-old) … near The Bean in Millennium Park.
“The crowd, along with the victim, follows (the 17-year-old) toward the exit at Madison and Michigan. At this point, the victim jumps onto the back of (the 17-year-old). A shot is heard,” and the suspected shooter ran south through the park where he was taken into custody a short distance away, according to the police report.
A second male, whose age was not listed in the police report, also was “observed in close proximity to (the 17-year-old) at the time of his arrest.” He also was seen pulling a gun from his waistband, but the police report notes he only took out the weapon after Holliday had been shot. When he saw officers coming toward him he also took off running, the report said, but he was stopped and detained after a brief foot chase.
The gun the second man pulled from his waistband was a ghost gun, meaning it does not have a serial number and can’t be traced, according to the police report. The term applies to guns that often are assembled from kits, frequently sold online, without buyers needing to go through background checks — a standard requirement for buyers when purchasing regular guns from a federally licensed firearms dealer. The loophole makes ghost guns easier for anyone, including minors, criminals and other prohibited purchasers, to acquire when they otherwise would not be allowed to own a firearm.
Chicago police guard the perimeter of Millennium Park in Chicago after a teenage boy was shot and fatally wounded near the Cloud Gate sculpture on May 14, 2022. (Terrence Antonio James / Chicago Tribune)
Along with the 26 juveniles arrested downtown Saturday night, police said four adults also were arrested. Seven guns were recovered and there were five arrests related to gun possession.
Two police officers also were injured while dispersing the crowds, but police did not provide information about how they were hurt or the types of injuries they suffered.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot issued a statement in the aftermath of the shooting Saturday night, calling out the “senseless loss of life” as “utterly unacceptable.”
“Tonight, a mother is grief-stricken, mourning the loss of her child and searching for answers. My heart is breaking for the mother as she grieves this unspeakable loss,” she said.
Two people are dead and three others are hurt from a shooting at a Houston flea market, where thousands of people were shopping on a busy Sunday, the Harris County Sheriff’s Office said.
The shooting appeared to stem from an altercation between five men, according to the sheriff’s office.
Two died on scene and three men were hospitalized in critical condition, the sheriff’s office said.
No innocent bystanders were hurt, authorities said.
Two possible suspects were detained at the scene and a third possible suspect was taken to a hospital, according to the sheriff’s office.
At least two pistols were recovered, authorities said.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
ABC News’ Nicholas Kerr contributed to this report.
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — Aaron Salter was a beloved community member and security guard who knew the shoppers of Tops Friendly Market by name. When they came under attack from a gunman with a rifle, he quickly sprung into action to protect his community.
The retired Buffalo police officer fired multiple times at the attacker, striking his armor-plated vest at least once. The bullet didn’t pierce, and Salter was shot and killed.
“He’s a true hero,” Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia said Sunday. “There could have been more victims if not for his actions.”
Salter was one of 10 killed in an attack whose victims represented a cross-section of life in the predominantly Black neighborhood in Buffalo, New York. They were gunned down by a white man who authorities say showed up at the store with the “express purpose” of killing Black people. Three others were wounded.
Salter “cared about the community. He looked after the store,” local resident Yvette Mack said. She remembered him as someone who “let us know if we was right or wrong.”
Mack would walk to the store to play lottery numbers and shop and said she spoke to Salter shortly before the shooting.
“I was playing my numbers. He said ‘I see your playing your numbers!’ I laughed. And he was playing his numbers too. Can you imagine seeing someone and you don’t know he’s not going to go home?”
The people Salter tried to protect include a man who was visiting relatives from out of town and was picking up a surprise birthday cake for his grandson.
“He never came out with the cake,” Clarissa Alston-McCutcheon said of her cousin. She said this sort of surprise was typical for him. He was “just a loving and caring guy. Loved family. Was always there for his family.”
Ruth Whitfield, the 86-year-old mother of retired Buffalo Fire Commissioner Garnell Whitfield. She had just returned from visiting her husband at a nursing home, as she did every day, when she stopped in at Tops to buy a few groceries and was killed, Whitfield told The Buffalo News.
Ruth Whitfield was “a mother to the motherless” and “a blessing to all of us,” her son said. He attributed her strength and commitment to family to her strong religious faith.
“She inspired me to be a man of God, and to do whatever I do the best I could do. I wouldn’t have been able to do it without her,” Whitfield said.
Also killed was shopper Katherine Massey, whose sister, Barbara Massey, called her “a beautiful soul.”
Zaire Goodman, 20, was among the wounded, having been shot in the neck, State Sen. Tim Kennedy told a church service on Sunday. Goodman is the son of a staffer for Kennedy.
“I’m devastated. I’m angry,” Kennedy said, adding that Goodman was recovering. “And I’m thinking about the families who won’t welcome a loved one home tonight.”
“That literally could’ve been me,” Ms. Calhoun said. “I’m just in shock. I’ve never had something like this happen so close to home.”
Ken Stephens, 68, a member of a local anti-violence group, described a grisly scene. “I came up here, and bodies were everywhere,” he said.
News of the shooting spread quickly across the city. Marilyn Hanson, 60, raced to Tops to make sure her daughter, who lived nearby, wasn’t among the victims; she was safe.
Both Ms. Hanson and her daughter shop at the store often.
“My daughter was so scared because that could’ve been me in that store,” Ms. Hanson said, adding: “If a Black man did this, he’d be dead, too,” referring to the fact that the shooter had surrendered and been taken into custody.
Daniel Love, 24, was inside his Love Barber Shop near the supermarket with his wife when he heard a noise, he said. His wife is from Iraq and immediately recognized the sound of gunfire. He told her to get down, he said. He eventually ran to the parking lot and saw the lifeless body of someone he knew.
Ulysees O. Wingo Sr., a member of the Buffalo Common Council who represents a district adjacent to the site of the shooting, said he also knew some victims. As he spoke, onlookers gathered at the site, with about 100 standing along a side street. Yellow police tape cordoned off the block surrounding the store, and at least two dozen police officers, along with several vehicles, guarded the perimeter.
“This is the largest mass shooting to date in the city of Buffalo,” Mr. Wingo said. “I don’t think anyone here in the city of Buffalo thought that something like this could ever happen, would ever happen.”
Mr. Wingo said most of the shoppers at the Tops supermarket were Black, mirroring the surrounding neighborhood.
Dorothy Simmons, 64, typically spends part of her Saturdays at Tops, shopping for food to prepare for Sunday dinner. “That’s what we do in this community,” said Ms. Simmons, who has lived in East Buffalo all her life. On this Saturday, Ms. Simmons was at work in Amherst when she heard the news. She cried, she said. “This is our store — this is our store,” Ms. Simmons said.
Ms. Simmons, who is Black, said the fact that the gunman was able to surrender showed disparity.
“If that had been my son, it would have never been surrender. We never had a chance to surrender,” Ms. Simmons said. “It would never be that way.”
Dan Higgins contributed reporting from Buffalo, New York.
RUSKA LOZOVA, Ukraine, May 15 (Reuters) – Russia pummelled positions in the east of Ukraine on Sunday, its defence ministry said, as it sought to encircle Ukrainian forces in the battle for Donbas and fend off a counteroffensive around the strategic Russian-controlled city of Izium.
At a meeting in Germany, the secretary-general of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) said Ukraine could win the war, calling for more military support and fast-track approval of expected bids by Finland and Sweden to join the alliance.
Ukraine has scored a series of successes since Russia invaded on Feb. 24, forcing Russia’s commanders to abandon an advance on the capital Kyiv before making rapid gains to drive them from Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-biggest city.
Moscow’s invasion, which it calls a “special operation” to disarm Ukraine and protect it from fascists, has jolted European security. Kyiv and its Western allies say the fascism assertion is a baseless pretext for an unprovoked war of aggression.
The president of Finland, which shares a 1,300 km (800 mile) border with Russia, confirmed on Sunday that his country would apply to join NATO, a major policy shift prompted by Russia’s invasion. Sweden’s ruling party followed suit. read more
Since mid-April, Russian forces have focused much of their firepower on trying to capture two eastern provinces known as the Donbas after failing to take Kyiv.
An assessment by British military intelligence said Russia had lost about a third of the ground combat force deployed in February. Its Donbas offensive had fallen “significantly behind schedule” and was unlikely to make rapid advances during the coming 30 days, the assessment said.
“Russia’s war in Ukraine is not going as Moscow had planned,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said.
Ukraine received a morale boost with victory in the Eurovision Song Contest on Saturday night, a triumph seen as sign of the strength of popular support for Ukraine across Europe. read more
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy welcomed the win, but said the situation in Donbas remained very difficult and Russian forces were still trying to salvage some kind of victory in a region riven by conflict since 2014.
“They are not stopping their efforts,” he said. read more
‘NOWHERE TO BURY ANYONE’
Russia said on Sunday it had struck Ukrainian positions in the east with missiles, targeting command centres and arsenals as its forces seek to surround Ukrainian units between Izium and Donetsk. Reuters was not able to independently confirm the reports. read more
Izium straddles the Donets river, about 120 km (75 miles) from Kharkiv on the main highway heading southeast.
If Ukraine can sustain pressure on Izium and Russian supply lines, that will make it harder for Moscow to encircle battle-hardened Ukrainian troops on the eastern front in the Donbas.
“The hottest spot remains the Izium direction,” Ukrainian regional governor Oleh Sinegubov said in comments aired on social media.
“Our armed forces have switched to a counteroffensive there. The enemy is retreating on some fronts.”
In Ruska Lozova, a village set in sweeping fields between Kharkiv and Ukraine’s border with Russia, Ukrainian commanders said they believed Moscow was redeploying troops to defend Izium while keeping their opponents pinned down with artillery fire.
“The Russian attack on Kharkiv has been destroyed and they understand this,” said Ihor Obolensky, who commands the National Guard and volunteer force that captured Ruska Lozova eight days ago. “They need to try for a new victory and want to hold Izium.”
But Ukraine’s military also acknowledged setbacks in an update on Sunday morning: “Despite losses, Russian forces continue to advance in the Lyman, Sievierodonetsk, Avdiivka and Kurakhiv areas in the broader Donbas region.”
In western Ukraine near Poland, missiles destroyed military infrastructure overnight on Saturday and were fired at the Lviv region from the Black Sea, Ukrainian officials said. read more
Nine civilians were wounded in Russian shelling of Sievierodonetsk hospital yesterday evening, Serhiy Gaidai, governor of the eastern Luhansk region, said on the Telegram messaging application.
Another 10 civilians were wounded in the southern region of Mykolaiv in the last 24 hours, the regional council said, without providing details. The reports could not be independently verified.
There was also no let-up on Sunday in Russia’s bombardment of the steel works in the southern port of Mariupol, where a few hundred Ukrainian fighters are holding out weeks after the city fell into Russian hands, the Ukrainian military said.
Brightly burning munitions were shown cascading down on the steel works in a video posted by a pro-Russian separatist commander. read more
A large convoy carrying refugees from the ruins of Mariupol arrived in the Ukrainian-controlled city of Zaporizhzhia after nightfall on Saturday after waiting days for Russian troops to allow them to leave. read more
Iryna Petrenko, a 63-year-old in the convoy, said she had stayed initially to take care of her 92-year-old mother, who subsequently died.
“We buried her next to her house, because there was nowhere to bury anyone,” she said.
MORE WEAPONS
Finland and Sweden have both said they see NATO membership as a way of bolstering their security, though Russia has warned that it would be a mistake for Helsinki to abandon its neutrality.
Sweden’s ruling Social Democrats came out in favour of the country joining NATO on Sunday, paving the way for an application and abandoning decades of military non-alignment. read more
NATO’s Stoltenberg and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken both expressed confidence that concerns from Turkey about the bids by the Baltic states could be overcome, with Stoltenberg indicating that an accelerated accession process and interim security arrangements would be possible. read more
As well as losing large numbers of men and much military equipment, Russia has been hit by economic sanctions, while Western states have provided Ukraine with military aid.
Ukraine has deployed many of its new U.S. M-777 howitzers at the front lines and Washington has delivered all but one of the 90 artillery pieces they were due to send, the U.S. embassy in Kyiv said. read more
CHICAGO — A 16-year-old boy was fatally shot near “The Bean” sculpture in downtown Chicago’s Millennium Park, authorities said.
Police said the teen was shot in the chest at about 7:30 p.m. Saturday near the popular tourist attraction. Police have not yet identified the boy.
He was taken to Lurie Children’s Hospital where he was pronounced dead, police said.
At least two suspects were taken in for questioning and at least two weapons were recovered, authorities said.
An investigation is ongoing. Police did not provide any additional information.
Hundreds of people were at the park earlier on Saturday as part of demonstrations across the U.S. protesting a recently leaked draft opinion that suggests the Supreme Court is prepared to overturn the constitutional right to abortion. It is unclear if the teen who was shot had taken part in the demonstration, which began around 1 p.m. Participants had largely dispersed by late afternoon.
Police cleared and closed the park following the shooting. It is unclear when it will reopen.
The shooting comes amid a surge in deadly violence in the city in recent years. This year, Chicago has recorded 779 shooting incidents and 194 homicides, compared to 898 shootings and 207 homicides during the same period in 2021, according to figures last updated by the Chicago Police Department on May 8.
Chicago and some other U.S. cities reported dramatic spikes in homicide totals last year. Chicago’s 797 homicides in 2021 — its highest toll for any year in a quarter century — eclipsed the totals in the two bigger U.S. cities, surpassing Los Angeles’ tally by 400 and New York’s by nearly 300.
Republican Senate hopeful Mehmet Oz has stepped up his criticism of far-right candidates in Pennsylvania who are gaining traction ahead of Tuesday’s primary election.
After spending much of the campaign steering clear of fellow Republican Senate contender Kathy Barnette, Oz said she was out of step with the Republican party and would be unable to win the general election in November.
In an interview, he took issue with a 2015 tweet from Barnette in which she wrote that “Pedophilia is a Cornerstone of Islam”. Oz, who would be the nation’s first Muslim senator, described the comments as “disqualifying”.
“It’s reprehensible that she would tweet out something that is defamatory to an entire religion,” Oz told the Associated Press. “This state was based on religious freedom. I’m proud as a Pennsylvanian to uphold those founding beliefs that every faith has its merits.”
The Barnette campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
Earlier in the week, Barnette told NBC News that she did not make the statement, though it was still live on her Twitter feed on Saturday.
For months, the race for the Republican nomination for Pennsylvania’s open Senate seat has been an expensive fight between former hedge fund CEO David McCormick and Oz, who have spent millions of dollars attacking each other on television.
But in the final days of the Republican primary, a third candidate – Barnette, a conservative commentator who has courted hard-line pro-Trump groups – has emerged. Trump himself has warned that Barnette’s background hasn’t been properly vetted.
With the election just days away, polls show a tight three-way race with a sizable number of undecided voters who could sway the results next week.
Oz has won Trump’s endorsement in the Senate contest, although some Trump supporters continue to question his conservative credentials.
Shortly after Mr. Gendron was captured,a manifesto believed to have been posted online by the gunman emerged, riddled with racist, anti-immigrant views that claimed white Americans were at risk of being replaced by people of color. In the video that appeared to have been captured by the camera affixed to his helmet, an anti-Black racial slur can be seen on the barrel of his weapon.
The attack, at a Tops Friendly Market in a largely Black neighborhood in east Buffalo, conjured grim comparisons to a series of other massacres motivated by racism, including the killing of nine Black parishioners at a church in Charleston, S.C., in 2015; an antisemitic rampage in a Pittsburgh synagogue in 2018 that left 11 people dead; and an attack at a Walmart in El Paso in 2019, where the man charged had expressed hatred of Latinos. More than 20 people died there.
In the Buffalo grocery store, where four employees died, the savagery and planning was evident: Mr. Gendron was armed with an assault weapon and wore body armor, the police said. And his preferred victims seemed clear as well: All told, 11 of the people shot were Black and two were white, the authorities said.
“It was a straight up racially motivated hate crime,” John Garcia, the Erie County sheriff, said.
In a news conference Saturday evening, Gov. Kathy Hochul — a Buffalo native — echoed that sentiment and decried the attack as an “act of barbarism” and an “execution of innocent human beings,” as well as a frightening reminder of the dangers of “white supremacist terrorism.”
“It strikes us in our very hearts to know that there is such evil that lurks out there,” Governor Hochul said.
Based on what was written in the manifesto, the attack appeared to have been inspired by earlier massacres that were motivated by racial hatred, including a mosque shooting in New Zealand and the Walmart shooting in Texas, both in 2019.
In the manifesto, which was being reviewed by law enforcement, Mr. Gendron — who had attended a community college in Binghamton, N.Y. — wrote that he had selected the area because it held the largest percentage of Black residents near his home in the state’s Southern Tier, a predominately white region that borders Pennsylvania.
The document outlined a careful plan to kill as many Black people as possible, complete with the type of gun he would use, a timeline, and where he would eat beforehand.
It also included details of where he would livestream the violence, mayhem that he had also calibrated. He carefully studied the layout of the grocery, writing that he would shoot a security guard before stalking through aisles and firing upon Black shoppers. He wrote that he would shoot some twice, in the chest, when he could.
He wrote he had been “passively preparing” for the Buffalo attack for several years, purchasing ammunition and gear, while infrequently practicing shooting. In January, the plans “actually got serious,” according to the manifesto, which also expressed praise for the perpetrator of the 2015 attack in South Carolina, and for a man who killed 51 Muslims at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, in 2019.
Mr. Gendron had read the racist writings of the New Zealand gunman, who had also livestreamed his attack, a method also used in a shooting at a Jewish synagogue in Halle, Germany, in 2019.
In an arraignment on Saturday evening, Mr. Gendron pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder, a charge that could lead to life imprisonment without parole.
The United States attorney in Buffalo, Trini E. Ross, said her office was also investigating the killings as federal hate crimes.
Other gunmen have referenced the racist idea known as “replacement theory,” an idea once associated with the far-right fringe, but one that has become increasingly mainstream, pushed by politicians and popular television programs.
Officials said the camera that the gunman wore was used to broadcast the attack live on Twitch, a livestreaming site owned by Amazon that is popular with gamers. On Saturday afternoon, Twitch said it had taken the channel offline. Still, screenshots of the broadcast were circulating online, including some that appeared to show the shooter holding a gun and standing over a body in the grocery store.
In his manifesto, Mr. Gendron seemed enthusiastic about broadcasting his attack, saying the livestream let “all people with the internet” watch and record the violence.
The massacre began around 2:30 p.m., the authorities said, when Mr. Gendron arrived at the market stepping out of his car — after a long drive on a sunny spring afternoon — dressed in tactical gear and body armor and carrying an assault weapon.
He shot four people in the parking lot, the Buffalo police commissioner, Joseph A. Gramaglia, said at the news conference, three of them fatally. When he entered the store and continued shooting, he encountered a security guard, a retired Buffalo police officer who returned fire. But Mr. Gendron was wearing heavy metal plating; he killed the guard and continued into the store, firing on shoppers and employees.
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When Buffalo police officers arrived and confronted Mr. Gendron, he put a gun to his neck, but two patrolmen persuaded him to drop his weapon and surrender, Mr. Gramaglia said.
The mayor of Buffalo, Byron W. Brown, said that he and his family periodically shopped at the store.
“Some of the victims of this shooter’s attack are people that all of us standing up here know,” said Mr. Brown, the fifth-term Democrat who was the first Black man elected mayor of Buffalo, New York’s second-largest city.
The 10 people killed in Buffalo represent the highest number of fatalities in a mass shooting in the United States this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, which tracks them. The highest death toll this year before that was six, in a shooting in downtown Sacramento on April 3. Six people were also killed in a shooting in Corsicana, Texas, on Feb. 5, and the same number were killed in a shooting in Milwaukee on Jan. 23, according to the site.
Gun deaths reached the highest number ever recorded in the United States in 2020, the first year of the pandemic, surging by 35 percent, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported on Tuesday.
Indeed, the gunfire shattered a seemingly serene Saturday afternoon, sending shoppers screaming and fleeing inside the Tops, and families scrambling to find loved ones outside the store.
Ken Stephens, 68, a member of a local anti-violence group, described a grisly scene. “I came up here, and bodies were everywhere,” he said.
The attack took place in a neighborhood known as Masten Park on Buffalo’s East Side. Dominique Calhoun, who lives within sight of the supermarket, said she was pulling into its parking lot to buy ice cream with her daughters — 8 and 9 years old — when she saw people running out and screaming.
“That literally could have been me,” she said of the people who were killed.
Dorothy Simmons, 64, typically spends part of her Saturdays at Tops, shopping for food to prepare for Sunday dinner, part of a common tradition in her community. On Saturday, however, she was at work in Amherst when she heard the news, and broke down and cried.
“This is our store,” Ms. Simmons said. “This is our store.”
Kellen Browning, Dan Higgins, Luke Hammill, Glenn Thrush, Adam Goldman, Alexandra E. Petri, Ashley Southall, Vimal Patel and Eduardo Medina contributed reporting. Jack Begg contributed research.
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — A gunman wearing military gear and livestreaming with a helmet camera opened fire with a rifle at a Buffalo, New York, supermarket in what authorities described as “racially motived violent extremism,” killing 10 people and wounding three others Saturday before he surrendered, authorities said.
Police officials said the gunman, who also wore body armor in addition to military-style clothing, pulled up in the afternoon and opened fire amid shoppers at a Tops Friendly Market, the shooting streamed via a camera affixed to the man’s helmet.
“He exited his vehicle. He was very heavily armed. He had tactical gear. He had a tactical helmet on. He had a camera that he was livestreaming what he was doing,” city Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia said at a news conference afterward.
Gramaglia said the gunman initially shot four people outside the store, three fatally. Inside the store, a security guard who was a retired Buffalo police officer fired multiple shots at the gunman and struck him, but the bullet hit the gunman’s bulletproof vest and had no effect, Gramaglia added. The commissioner said the gunman then killed the security guard.
Video also captured the suspect as he walked into the supermarket where he shot several other victims inside, according to authorities.
Police said 11 of the victims were Black and two are white. The supermarket is in a predominantly Black neighborhood a few miles (kilometers) north of downtown Buffalo.
“This is the worst nightmare that any community can face, and we are hurting and we are seething right now,” Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown said at the news conference. “The depth of pain that families are feeling and that all of us are feeling right now cannot even be explained.”
Gramaglia said Buffalo police entered the store and confronted the gunman in the vestibule.
“At that point the suspect put the gun to his own neck. Buffalo police personnel — two patrol officers — talked the suspect into dropping the gun. He dropped the gun, took off some of his tactical gear, surrendered at that point. And he was led outside, put in a police car,” he said.
The suspected gunman was later identified as Payton Gendron, 18, of Conklin, a New York state community about 200 miles (320 kilometers) southeast of Buffalo, two law enforcement officials told The Associated Press. The officials were not permitted to speak publicly on the matter and did so on the condition of anonymity.
The suspect was being questioned Saturday evening by the FBI, one of the officials said, and Conklin was expected to appear in court later Saturday.
At the news briefing, Erie County Sheriff John Garcia pointedly called the shooting a hate crime.
“This was pure evil. It was straight up racially motivated hate crime from somebody outside of our community, outside of the City of Good neighbors … coming into our community and trying to inflict that evil upon us,” Garcia said.
Elsewhere, NAACP President Derrick Johnson issued a statement in which he called the shooting “absolutely devastating.”
“Our hearts are with the community and all who have been impacted by this terrible tragedy. Hate and racism have no place in America. We are shattered, extremely angered and praying for the victims’ families and loved ones,” he added.
Separately, the Rev. Al Sharpton called on the White House to convene a meeting with Black, Jewish and Asian “to underscore the Federal government (is) escalating its efforts against hate crimes.” In a tweet, Sharpton said that “leaders of all these communities should stand together on this!”
The shooting came little more than a year after a March 2021 attack at a King Soopers grocery in Boulder, Colorado, that killed 10 people. Investigators have not released any information about why they believe the man charged in that attack targeted the supermarket.
At the scene in Buffalo on Saturday afternoon, police closed off an entire block, lined by spectators, and yellow police taped surrounded the full parking lot.
Braedyn Kephart and Shane Hill, both 20, pulled into the parking lot just as the shooter was exiting. They described him as a white male in his late teens or early twenties sporting full camo, a black helmet and what appeared to be a rifle.
“He was standing there with the gun to his chin. We were like what the heck is going on? Why does this kid have a gun to his face?” Kephart said. He dropped to his knees. “He ripped off his helmet, dropped his gun, and was tackled by the police.”
Tops Friendly Markets released a statement saying, “We are shocked and deeply saddened by this senseless act of violence and our thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their families.”
At the White House, Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said President Joe Biden was receiving regular updates on the shooting and the investigation and had offered prayers with the first lady for the victims and their loved ones.
“The president has been briefed by his Homeland Security advisor on the horrific shooting in Buffalo, N.Y., this afternoon. He will continue to receive updates throughout the evening and tomorrow as further information develops,” she said.
Attorney General Merrick Garland was briefed on the shooting, Justice Department spokesperson Anthony Coley said.
More than two hours after the shooting, Erica Pugh-Mathews was waiting outside the store, behind police tape.
“We would like to know the status of my aunt, my mother’s sister. She was in there with her fiance, they separated and went to different aisles,” she said. “A bullet barely missed him. He was able to hide in a freezer but he was not able to get to my aunt and does not know where she is. We just would like word either way if she’s OK.”
___
Associated Press reporters John Wawrow in Buffalo and Eric Tucker in Washington contributed to this report. Balsamo reported from Washington and Collins reported from Hartford, Connecticut.
“Without abortion, I would not be here,” said Ms. Rains, who stood in the plaza with her 5-month-old daughter, Hendrix, and 3-year-old son, Jagger. At five months pregnant in November 2020, she said, she started losing large amounts of blood, forcing her medical providers to perform an abortion to save her life.
“I very much wanted my daughter,” she said, “but I was bleeding and there was nothing they could do.”
For some, protesting the draft opinion was not just about protecting the right to abortion.
Lillian Penafiel, 35, and her wife, Emi Penafiel, 44, worried about what the court’s ruling could mean for marriage equality, L.G.B.T.Q. rights and voting rights.
“They’ve been very clear, especially what was written up, that our rights are going to be threatened as well, too, so that’s why we’re nervous,” said Emi Penafiel. “They’re coming after all of it.”
Many parents came with their children. Sonia Reiter, 41, who is pregnant, brought her 5-year-old son, Casio Coleman, to the march to educate him on the importance of choice, she said.
“Casio, how did we talk about today’s protest, what’d we say?” Ms. Reiter asked her son. “If someone wants to be pregnant, they should be pregnant — and if they don’t want to be pregnant?”
“They shouldn’t,” he replied, beaming at his mother.
In Los Angeles, protesters filled Grand Park in front of City Hall and chanted phrases such as, “We won’t go back, we won’t back down!” An estimated 5,000 people were on hand.
In private meetings on Friday with representatives of international banks in New York, Adewale Adeyemo, the deputy Treasury secretary, laid out the consequences of helping Russians flout sanctions. He pointed to the “material support provision” that dictates that even if a financial institution is based in a country that has not imposed sanctions on Russia, the company can still face consequences for violating U.S. or European restrictions, including being cut off from those financial systems.
“If you provide material support to a sanctioned individual or a sanctioned entity, we can extend our sanctions regime to you and use our tools to go after you as well,” Mr. Adeyemo said in an interview on Friday. “I want to make that very clear to these institutions that are domiciled and other countries that may not have taken sanctions actions: that the United States and our allies and partners are prepared to act if they do things that violate our sanctions.”
The Biden administration has placed sweeping restrictions on Russian financial institutions, oligarchs and its central bank. It has coordinated with allies in Europe and Asia to crack down on sanctions evasion; the direct warning to foreign banks was part of that effort.
Financial institutions from China, Brazil, Ireland, Japan and Canada were at the meeting, which was hosted by the Institute of International Bankers.
Mr. Adeyemo said that U.S. banks had been careful to avoid violating American sanctions, but that Russian individuals and businesses were looking to set up trusts and use proxies as workarounds. He also pointed to firms that might be providing support to oligarchs who are subject to sanctions and trying to move their yachts to different ports to avoid seizure.
Most jurisdictions have been complying with the sanctions, but some, such as the United Arab Emirates, have continued to provide havens for Russian assets. The yachts of several Russian oligarchs have been docked in Dubai.
“You’ve seen a number of Russian yachts move from ports, countries that have extended sanctions to countries that haven’t,” Mr. Adeyemo said. “We want to make clear to people that if you’re a financial institution, and you have a business that is a customer that is providing material support to one of these yachts, you, that business, could be subject to our material support provision.”
Referring to his message to foreign banks, he added: “You need to make sure that not only are you making sure that you’re watching flows into your financial institution, but you need to also help by reminding the businesses that you support that they, too, you don’t want them to be providing material support to Russian oligarchs or Russian businesses as well.”
Banks and financial institutions around the world have been grappling with how to remain in compliance with the waves of new sanctions against Russia.
Citigroup, the largest U.S. bank in Russia, with about 3,000 employees there, was in “active dialogue” to sell its Russian consumer and commercial-bank businesses, Jane Fraser, its chief executive, told Bloomberg this month.
Citigroup trimmed its exposure in Russia to $7.9 billion in March, down from $9.8 billion at the end of last year, according to a filing. “This weaponization of financial services is a very, very big deal,” Ms. Fraser said at a conference this month. She said she expected global capital flows to splinter as nations developed new financial systems to avoid being too reliant on Western firms.
Foreign banks with U.S. operations can find themselves caught between conflicting demands. In some cases, U.S. sanctions have required them to cut off longtime customers. Those who resisted doing so learned how serious the authorities could be about tracking down violators and hitting them with big fines.
In 2019, for instance, the British bank Standard Chartered paid $1.1 billion to settle cases brought by the Justice Department, Treasury, New York’s state banking regulator and state prosecutors over transactions it had carried out for Cuba, Syria, Iran and Sudan in violation of U.S. sanctions. Two years earlier, Deutsche Bank paid $630 million after it was caught helping Russian investors sneak $10 billion into Western financial centers. The international giants HSBC and BNP Paribas have also paid billions in the past 10 years to settle sanctions violations cases.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Supporters of abortion rights took to the streets across America on Saturday to make clear their anger at the prospect that the Supreme Court will soon strike down the constitutional right to abortion. Cries of “My body, my choice” rang out as activists committed to fighting for the legal protection that has endured for nearly a half-century.
Incensed by a leaked draft opinion suggested the conservative majority on the court would vote to overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling, activists rallied to express their outrage and mobilize for the future as Republican-led states are poised to enact tighter restrictions.
In the nation’s capital, thousands gathered in drizzly weather at the Washington Monument to listen to fiery speeches before marching to the Supreme Court, which is now surrounded by two layers of security fences.
The mood was one of anger and defiance.
“I can’t believe that at my age, I’m still having to protest over this,” said Samantha Rivers, a 64-year-old federal government employee who is preparing for a state-by-state battle over abortion rights.
Caitlin Loehr, 34, of Washington, wore a black T-shirt with an image of the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s “dissent” collar on it and a necklace that spelled out “vote.”
“I think that women should have the right to choose what to do with their bodies and their lives. And I don’t think banning abortion will stop abortion. It just makes it unsafe and can cost a woman her life,” Loehr said.
A half-dozen anti-abortion demonstrators sent out a countering message, with Jonathan Darnel shouting into a microphone, “Abortion is not health care, folks, because pregnancy is not an illness.”
From Pittsburgh to Pasadena, California, and Nashville, Tennessee, to Lubbock, Texas, tens of thousands participated in “Bans off our Bodies” events. Organizers expected that among the hundreds of events, the largest would take place in Chicago, New York, Los Angeles and other big cities.
“If it’s a fight they want, it’s a fight they’ll get,” Rachel Carmona, executive director of the Women’s March, said before the march.
Polls show that most Americans want to preserve access to abortion — at least in the earlier stages of pregnancy — but the Supreme Court appeared to be poised to let the states have the final say. If that happens, roughly half of states, mostly in the South and Midwest, are expected to quickly ban abortion.
The battle was personal for some protesters.
Teisha Kimmons, who traveled 80 miles to attend the Chicago rally, said she fears for women in states that are ready to ban abortion. She said she might not be alive today if she had not had a legal abortion when she was 15.
“I was already starting to self harm and I would have rather died than have a baby,” said Kimmons, a massage therapist from Rockford, Illinois.
At that rally, speaker after speaker told the crowd that if abortion is banned that the rights of immigrants, minorities and others will also be “gutted,” as Amy Eshleman, wife of Chicago Mayor Lori lightfoot put it.
“This has never been just about abortion. It’s about control,” Eshleman told the crowd of thousands. “My marriage is on the menu and we cannot and will not let that happen,” she added.
In New York, thousands of people gathered in Brooklyn’s courthouse plaza before a march across the Brooklyn Bridge to lower Manhattan where another rally was planned.
“We’re here for the women who can’t be here, and for the girls who are too young to know what is ahead for them,” Angela Hamlet, 60, of Manhattan, said to the backdrop of booming music.
Robin Seidon, who traveled from Montclair, New Jersey, for the rally, said the nation was a place abortion rights supporters have long feared.
“They’ve been nibbling at the edges, and it was always a matter of time before they thought they had enough power on the Supreme court, which they have now,” said Seidon, 65.
In Texas, which has a strict law banning many abortions, the challenger to one of the last anti-abortion Democrats in Congress marched in San Antonio.
Jessica Cisneros joined demonstrators just days before early voting begins in her primary runoff against U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar. The race could be one of the first tests over whether the court leak will galvanize voters.
In Chicago, Kjirsten Nyquist, a nurse toting daughters ages 1 and 3, agreed about the need to vote. “As much as federal elections, voting in every small election matters just as much,” she said.
Saturday’s rallies come three days after the Senate failed to muster enough votes to codify Roe v. Wade. Sponsors included the Women’s March, Move On, Planned Parenthood, UltraViolet, MoveOn, SEIU and other organizations.
—-
Sharp reported from Portland, Maine. Associated Press writers Don Babwin in Chicago, David Porter in New York, Paul Weber in San Antonio, and Jacquelyn Martin and Anna Johnson in Washington contributed to this report.
ISTANBUL, May 14 (Reuters) – Turkey has not shut the door to Sweden and Finland joining NATO but wants negotiations with the Nordic countries and a clampdown on what it sees as terrorist activities especially in Stockholm, President Tayyip Erdogan’s spokesman said on Saturday.
“We are not closing the door. But we are basically raising this issue as a matter of national security for Turkey,” Ibrahim Kalin, who is also the president’s top foreign policy advisor, told Reuters in an interview in Istanbul.
Erdogan surprised NATO members and the two Nordic countries seeking membership by saying on Friday it was not possible for Turkey to support enlarging the alliance because Finland and Sweden were “home to many terrorist organisations”.
Any country seeking to join the North Atlantic Treaty Alliance needs the unanimous support of the members of the military alliance. The United States and other member states have been trying to clarify Ankara’s position. read more
Sweden and its closest military partner, Finland, have until now remained outside NATO, which was founded in 1949 to counter the Soviet Union in the Cold War. The two countries are wary of antagonising their large neighbour but their security concerns have increased since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24. read more
Stockholm is widely expected to follow Helsinki’s lead and could apply for entry to the 30-nation military alliance as early as Monday. read more
Kalin said the militant Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) – designated a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the United States and the European Union – was fund-raising and recruiting in Europe and its presence is “strong and open and acknowledged” in Sweden in particular.
“What needs to be done is clear: they have to stop allowing PKK outlets, activities, organisations, individuals and other types of presence to…exist in those countries,” Kalin said.
“NATO membership is always a process. We will see how things go. But this is the first point that we want to bring to the attention of all the allies as well as to Swedish authorities,” he added. “Of course we want to have a discussion, a negotiation with Swedish counterparts.”
‘MUTUAL POINT OF VIEW’
Turkey, the second-largest military in NATO, has officially supported enlargement since it joined the U.S.-led alliance 70 years ago.
For years it has criticised Sweden and other European countries for their handling of organisations deemed terrorists by Turkey, including the followers of U.S.-based Islamic cleric Fethullah Gulen.
Article 5 of NATO’s founding treaty says an attack on any NATO country should be seen as an attack on all. While Sweden and Finland have long had close relations with NATO, they are not covered by its security guarantee.
Turkey has criticised Russia’s invasion, helped arm Ukraine – which is not in NATO – and tried to facilitate talks between the sides but opposes sanctions on Moscow. It wants NATO “to address the concerns of all members, not just some,” Kalin said.
Asked whether Turkey risked being too transactional at a time of war, and when Finnish and Swedish public opinion favours NATO membership, he said: “One hundred percent of our population is very upset with the PKK and FETO (Gulenist) presence in Europe.”
“If they (Finland and Sweden) have a public concerned about their own national security, we have a public that is equally concerned about our own security,” he said. “We have to see this from a mutual point of view.”
Kalin said Russia’s sharp criticism of Finland and Sweden over their plans was not a factor in Turkey’s position.
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