JACKSONVILLE: A white man fatally shot three folks inside a Jacksonville, Florida, Greenback Common retailer on Saturday in a predominately Black neighbourhood in an assault that the native sheriff known as “racially motivated.” The shooter then killed himself. “He hated black people,” Sheriff T Okay Waters informed a information convention. “There is absolutely no evidence the shooter is part of any larger group.”
Waters stated the shooter, who was in his 20s, used a Glock handgun and an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle with not less than one of many firearms painted with a swastika.
He left behind writings that led investigators to consider that he dedicated the capturing as a result of it was the fifth anniversary of when one other gunman opened fireplace throughout a online game event in Jacksonville, killing two folks earlier than fatally capturing himself.
The capturing occurred simply earlier than 2 pm at a Greenback Common close to Edward Waters College, a small traditionally Black college.
The shooter had pushed there from neighbouring Clay County. Shortly earlier than the assault, the shooter had despatched his father a textual content message telling him to verify his pc. The daddy discovered writings and the household notified 911, however the capturing had already begun, Sheriff Waters stated.
Edward Waters College college students had been being stored of their dorms, the college stated in an announcement. No college students or school are believed concerned, the college stated.
Penny Jones informed the The Related Press that she labored on the retailer till just a few months in the past. She lives just a few blocks away within the predominantly Black neighbourhood.
“I’m just waiting to hear about my co-workers that I used to work with,” Jones stated. “I don’t know if it’s safe to move about the neighbourhood.”
Jones added that she was “feeling awkward, scared.”
“I don’t want to leave my house. I’m thinking, do I want to go back to the store? Is this going to start happening more frequently? I don’t know what the cause of it is. I’m confused. It’s a lot of different feelings going on right now,” she stated Saturday afternoon.
The lethal capturing came about inside hours of the conclusion of a commemorative March on Washington within the nation’s capital, the place organizers drew consideration to the rising menace of hate-motivated violence in opposition to folks of coloration.
An assault on a buying centre in a predominately Black neighbourhood will undoubtedly evoke fears of previous shootings concentrating on Black People, just like the one at a Buffalo, New York, grocery store in 2022, and one at a historic African Methodist Episcopal church in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015.
The Buffalo grocery store capturing, particularly, stands aside as one of many deadliest focused assaults on Black folks by a white lone gunman in US historical past. Ten folks had been killed by the gunman, who has been sentenced to life in jail with out the potential for parole.