On Saturday, a white man fueled by racial hatred shot dead three Black people in a Florida discount store, later taking his own life after a standoff with police. The shooting occurred near a historically Black college, with the shooter being there earlier that day. Other instances of gun violence were reported across the United States during the same weekend.
A white man driven by racial hatred shot dead three Black people in a Florida discount store Saturday before taking his own life after a standoff with police, authorities said.
“He targeted a certain group of people, and that’s Black people. That’s what he said he wanted to kill. And that’s very clear,” Jacksonville Sheriff TK Waters told a news conference about the gunman, who was in his early 20s.
According to the sheriff’s office, the shooter, who has not yet been identified, entered a Dollar General store wearing a tactical vest armed with an AR-style rifle and a handgun.
Manifestos discovered by the gunman’s family shortly before the attack “detail the shooter’s disgusting ideology of hate,” Waters said, and at least one of the guns had hand-drawn swastikas on it.
The shooting took place near Edward Waters University, a historically Black college in the southern US state.
The university said that the shooter had been on campus earlier that day, though no one was harmed.
“The individual refused to identify themselves and was asked to leave.”
The FBI will investigate the shooting as a hate crime, said Sherri Onks, the bureau’s special agent for Jacksonville, a city of nearly one million in the northeast corner of the state.
There was no evidence the shooter was part of a larger group, officials said.
Mass shootings have become disturbingly common across the United States, with easy access to firearms in most states and more guns in the country than citizens.
The shooting was part of a weekend spate of gun violence in the United States.
Earlier Saturday, at least seven people were hospitalized after a shooting at a Caribbean festival in the northeast city of Boston, police said.
Miroslava Salazar, with AFP
