`I just heard shots. Shots and shots and shots'
Ten killed at Buffalo supermarket during mass shooting described as racially motivated hate crime
BUFFALO, N.Y. — Ten people were killed during a mass shooting Saturday afternoon at a Buffalo grocery store in what police described as a racially motivated hate crime.
Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia told reporters that a heavily armed 18-year-old white man entered the store in a predominantly Black neighbourhood and shot 13 people, including a security guard. He later surrendered to police and remains in custody.
Eleven of the 13 people shot were Black, Gramaglia said.
The suspect, who was heavily armed and wearing tactical gear, used a camera attached to his body to livestream the attack and shot several victims in the parking lot before entering the store.
The grocery's longtime security guard — a “hero in our eyes,” said Gramaglia — engaged the shooter but was killed in the encounter. Four of those killed were store employees and six were customers, law enforcement officials said.
Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown said the shooter, who has not been identified by officials, was not from the city. He said it was “a day of great pain for our community.”
New York Democratic Rep. Brian Higgins said the shooting was part of a countrywide problem: “When you have assault rifles in the possession of the wrong people, these kinds of things happen. and they happen far too often.”
FBI special agent Stephen Belongia said law enforcement officials were investigating the shooting as a hate crime and a case of racially motivated violent extremism, and that charges would reflect that along with murder charges.
The Tops Friendly Markets store, which is located in a lower-income area of Buffalo, is a popular one that serves many people who live in the area. It's centrally located near several area colleges, including Canisius College and Buffalo State College, as well as a number of area churches.
The supermarket is about 10 minutes from the Canalside area of Buffalo, a popular area among locals and visitors.
A worker in the frozen dairy section who identified himself as Will G. told the Buffalo News that he had walked into the cooler to stock milk just minutes before the shooting. As gunfire rang out, he ended up joining others who hid in the cooler.
“I just heard shots. Shots and shots and shots,” he said to the News. “It sounded like things were falling over.”
He added, “I hid. I just hid. I wasn't going to leave that room. I was scared out of my wits.”
The shooting at the Buffalo grocery store Saturday echoes the March 2021 mass shooting in Boulder, Colo., when 10 people, including a police officer, were killed at a King Soopers grocery store.