THURSDAY, March 28, 2024
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‘Racist’ suspect in court after mass shooting at US supermarket

‘Racist’ suspect in court after mass shooting at US supermarket

An 18-year-old white gunman who shot and killed 10 people and wounded three others at a grocery store in a Black neighbourhood of Buffalo on Saturday, has been arraigned.

Authorities said the suspect, who was armed with an assault-style rifle and appeared to have acted alone, drove to Buffalo from his home in a New York county "hours away" to target the store in an attack he broadcast on the internet. Eleven of the 13 people struck by gunfire were Black, officials said.

"To see the sense of security shattered by an individual, a white supremacist who has engaged in an act of terrorism and will be prosecuted as such in a cold-hearted cruel calculating way ... targeting people who simply want to buy groceries," New York Governor Kathy Hochul said.

The suspect, who was not immediately named by police, was heavily armed and dressed in tactical gear, including body armour, police said.

When confronted by officers in a vestibule of the store, the suspect held a gun to his neck but they talked him into dropping the weapon and surrendering, Buffalo police commissioner Joseph Gramaglia told a news briefing.

The gunman shot and killed three people in the parking lot of the Tops Friendly Market before exchanging fire with a former police officer working as a security guard for the store, but the suspect was protected by his body armour.

The guard was one of the 10 people shot to death in the incident, the nine others all being customers. Three other employees of the store, part of a regional chain, were wounded but are expected to survive, authorities said

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