FBI: Motive for Gilroy Garlic Festival shooting may never be known
The motive behind Sunday’s mass shooting at the Garlic Festival may never be known, authorities said at a news conference Thursday, as their investigation into what drove Santino Legan to open fire on a crowd of families in his hometown dragged into a sixth day.
Law enforcement agencies are examining Legan’s digital footprint, including his social media presence, electronic devices, and computer hardware seized in searches Monday at the shooter’s family home in Gilroy, and a remote Nevada apartment where he had been living since May. Federal investigators and FBI profilers from around the country have been brought in to assist in the investigation, special agent-in-charge John Bennett said – but they have still yet to figure out a motive.
“We have not yet determined the ideology” of the shooter, Bennett said.
So far, authorities have been circumspect about whether Legan may have been fueled by extremist views, a question born out messages the 19-year-old posted to his Instagram page shortly before the shooting, including one that encouraged people to read a 1890 white supremacy manifesto popular among right-wing extremists, and another referencing the Garlic Festival.
Gilroy Police Chief Scot Smithee also said Thursday that police had identified an additional shooting victim – who had sought their own treatment for a graze wound – bringing the total of people killed or wounded in the shooting to 16. The three victims who died have been identified as 6-year-old Stephen Romero and 13-year-old Keyla Salazar, of San Jose, and 25-year-old Trevor Irby, who had recently moved to Santa Cruz from upstate New York.
Smithee also released the names of the three officers who rushed to the gunfire Sunday, fatally shooting Legan within minutes of his first shots. They are Eric Cryar, Hugo Del Moral and Robert Basuino, who have 23, 17, and 13 years of police experience respectively.
“I think they’re heroes,” Smithee said. “I don’t think they’re particularly excited about being in the limelight, but I certainly think that they deserve recognition for what they did.”
Bennett also praised the officers’ actions.
“They really acted with tremendous courage,” Bennett said. “Where most people run from gunfire, they ran toward it. And that saved lives. There is no doubt.”
Bennett said the crime-scene examination of the festival site at Christmas Hill Park is progressing and that the cordoned area has dropped by 50% since Sunday. Vendors and victims who left behind their property and belongings while fleeing the gunfire can find help online at fbi. gov/gilroyvictims. Videos and photos can be uploaded for FBI investigative review at fbi.gov/gilroy.
Authorities have also generally ruled out that Legan was working with an accomplice, noting that he was recorded on security cameras at stores throughout town, alone, in the hours leading up to the shooting late Sunday afternoon, as the 41st iteration of the garlic festival was coming to a close.
“I don’t think I’m prepared to say absolutely,” Smithee said. “I’m feeling very confident of that, but again there’s so much data to go though and so many witnesses to talk to. I think I’ll wait until we’ve gone through all of that before I make that an absolute.”
A search of of Legan’s car, which was found several blocks northwest of where he reportedly cut through a perimeter fence at the festival grounds, turned up an unused shotgun purchased by Legan earlier this month in Nevada. A bag full of ammunition, also believed to belong to Legan, was found in a creek near the festival site.
At his apartment, FBI agents and deputies with the Mineral County Sheriff’s Office in Nevada also retrieved a bulletproof vest, gas mask, empty ammo boxes, gun pamphlets, an empty bottle of Valium. Several news outlets, including The San Francisco Chronicle and the Associated Press, have reported that the search also turned up white supremacist and radical Islam reading materials, though the FBI has disputed those accounts.
Asked whether Legan focused his fire on any one particular group, Bennett said that did not appear to be the case.
“As we look at the injuries and the victims that are out there, it doesn’t seem clear that he was targeting any particular group,” he said. “It seems very random at this point.”