‘Target list’ found in Gilroy shooting
FBI opens domestic terrorism case
LOS ANGELES — The discovery of a “target list” containing religious institutions, courthouses and other sites compiled by the gunman in a mass shooting at a California food festival has prompted the FBI to open a domestic terrorism case.
Shooter Santino W. Legan, 19, appeared to be interested in conflicting ideologies, but authorities still have not determined a motive for the July 28 attack that killed three people, including two children, said John Bennett, the FBI’s agent in charge in San Francisco.
Authorities have not found a written explanation from Legan, but Bennett said they cannot rule out white nationalism as a factor.
Investigators were examining Legan’s digital media to determine his possible ideology, who he may have been in contact with regarding the ideologies, who if anyone helped him, and why he committed the violence, Bennett said.
The list, which also included federal buildings and both major U.S. political parties, was found during the examination of the digital evidence. Bennett said the groups included were being notified but the FBI would not release their names.
Bennett said there is no indication that Legan did anything violent prior to attacking people at the Gilroy Garlic Festival with an AK-47-style rifle before turning the gun on himself. Thirteen people were injured.
A separate mass shooting that killed 22 people at a crowded El Paso, Texas, store over the weekend was also being handled as a domestic terrorism case.
The FBI has not said it was treating the mass shooting in Dayton, Ohio, as an act of domestic terrorism. A gunman killed nine people in a nightclub district.
The FBI’s announcement Tuesday came as the family of Gilroy victim Keyla Salazar held a funeral Mass for the 13-year-old girl.
Bennett told victims’ families that nothing he could say or do would bring back their loved ones.
Still, he said, “Everything is being done with you in our minds.”