Category Archives: Gun crime

Sandy Hook families speak out after Uvalde school shooting

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Bereaved say it is ‘beyond time to take action’ on gun control in the wake of the killing of 19 children in Texas

The families of people killed in the Sandy Hook elementary school shooting have pleaded for action on gun control in the wake of the killings at Robb elementary school in Texas.

Erica Leslie Lafferty, whose mother was killed in the massacre in Connecticut in 2012, said that it was “beyond time to take action” in the wake of the attack in Uvalde which has left at least 19 children and two adults dead.

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Man shot and killed on New York subway in latest ‘unprovoked’ attack

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Police investigate death of Daniel Enriquez on busy train on Sunday morning

An unidentified man shot and killed a passenger on a subway train in New York in what police officials said appeared to be an unprovoked attack.

The incident happened on a Q train travelling over the Manhattan Bridge at about 11.40am on Sunday, a time when the subway is often filled with families, tourists and people heading to brunch.

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‘I’m not afraid’: after Buffalo racist attack, Black residents remain unbowed by terror

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If the alleged mass murderer’s goal was to inflict terror, then the man responsible for this trauma failed miserably

Less than an hour after the city of Buffalo, New York, took a 123-second pause on Saturday to memorialize the victims of the terrorist attack that shook the city a week ago, June Bloomfield held her own moment of silence.

Standing outside the Tops Market, the only grocery store in the area, where white supremacy stole the lives of 10 people, Bloomfield’s tears were obscured by sunglasses, a mask and her quiet resolve. “It’s not fear”, she said, trying to summon the words that described her feelings. “It’s … All I can say is, I’m not afraid.”

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Dallas shooting suspect harbored delusions about Asian people, police say

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Jeremy Smith, 36, arrested on three counts of assault with a deadly weapon over Koreatown hair salon attack that left three wounded

Authorities in Dallas said on Tuesday the man suspected of opening fire in a hair salon in the city’s Koreatown and wounding three women of Asian descent harbored delusions about Asian people since having a car crash involving an Asian man two years ago.

Police identified the gunman as Jeremy Smith, 36, and said he has been charged with three counts of assault with a deadly weapon. Smith was booked early on Tuesday is being held in Dallas county jail.

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Buffalo shooting: gunman ‘plotted attack for months’

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Online posts apparently by 18-year-old suspect Payton Gendron indicate previous visit to site where 10 Black people were killed

The white gunman accused of the massacre of 10 Black people at a Buffalo supermarket wrote as far back as November about staging a livestreamed attack on African Americans. He also practised shooting from his car and travelled hours from his home to scout out the store in March, according to detailed diary entries he appears to have posted online.

The author of the diary posted hand-drawn maps of the grocery store along with tallies of the number of Black people he counted there, and recounted how a Black security guard at the supermarket confronted him that day to ask what he was up to. A Black security guard was among the dead in Saturday’s rampage.

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Buffalo shooting: what we know about the victims so far

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Eleven of the 13 victims were Black, and two were white, after an 18-year-old white man opened fire at a supermarket in New York

An 18-year-old white man opened fire at a Buffalo, New York, supermarket on Saturday, killing 10 people and wounding three others in what authorities have described as a “hate crime and racially motivated violent extremism”.

Eleven of the 13 victims were Black, and two were white.

This is a developing story and will be updated accordingly.

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‘It was by design’: Black residents try to come to terms with horror of shooting

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‘Who pushed this into his head?’ a Buffalo resident asks, while another asks, ‘What made you drive all this way and hit this?’

Vigils were held across Buffalo, New York, for the victims of the Tops Friendly shooting Sunday, as Black residents on the city’s East Side mourned and attempted to come to terms with the brief, brutal event that had been visited on the neighborhood hours earlier.

The square where the shooting took place, surrounded by vacant lots that residents said were the result of decades of segregation and systemic racism, is the community’s center, with Tops Friendly functioning as the only grocery store for the immediate area.

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Buffalo shooting: Biden says racist killing of 10 people ‘abhorrent to fabric of nation’

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Gunman shot 11 Black and two white victims at a supermarket that he broadcast on streaming platform Twitch before surrendering

After a white 18-year-old wearing military gear and live-streaming with a helmet camera opened fire with a rifle at a supermarket in Buffalo, killing 10 people and wounding three others, US president Joe Biden said racially motivated hate crime was “abhorrent to the very fabric of this nation”.

Police said the attacker shot 11 Black and two white victims before surrendering to authorities in an assault he broadcast on the streaming platform Twitch. Later, he appeared before a judge in a paper medical gown and was arraigned on a first-degree murder charge. He pleaded not guilty.

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Buffalo shooting: teenager accused of killing 10 in racist supermarket attack

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Alleged gunman Payton Gendron, 18, charged with murder after 13 shot at store in mostly Black neighbourhood

A teenager in military-style clothing opened fire with a rifle at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, in a shooting that officials called a “hate crime and racially motivated violent extremism”, killing 10 people and wounding three others before surrendering to police on Saturday afternoon, authorities said.

Police officials said the 18-year-old, who is white, was wearing body armour and military-style clothing when he pulled up and started shooting at a Tops Friendly Market at about 2.30pm. The attack was streamed via a camera fixed to the man’s helmet.

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‘Cheering section’ for violence: the attacks that show 4chan is still a threat

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The Washington DC shooting was the most recent to spawn out of the extremist culture of unregulated ‘chan’ message boards

When police in Washington DC burst into a fifth-floor apartment building on 22 April in search of a man who allegedly had shot four people at random, they found Raymond Spencer dead by his own hand, a cache of guns and ammunition, and a poster with an ironic white supremacist meme.

The poster invoking the meme, popular on the extremist online forum 4chan, was a stark reminder that this attack blamed on Spencer, 23, was only the most recent mass casualty attack to spawn out of the ugly extremist culture of unregulated internet message boards such as 4chan.

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Gun violence becomes leading cause of death among US youth, data shows

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A report reveals a 30% increase in firearm-related deaths between 2019 and 2020, including incidents of suicides and accidental shootings

Gun violence overtook car accidents as the leading cause of death among children and adolescents in the US in 2020, according to a report from the University of Michigan.

The finding was published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Wednesday as part of longer term research effort from the university’s Institute for Firearm Injury Prevention (IFIP).

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Suspect in shooting that injured four near Washington school found dead, police say

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The man was identified from video he had posted on social media that appeared to show gunshots fired

A gunman opened fire on random victims from a sniper’s nest on the upper floor of an apartment building near an elite prep school in Washington, wounding four people before taking his own life as police burst into his dwelling.

Police said on Friday evening the suspect, Raymond Spencer, 23, of suburban Fairfax, Virginia, was initially identified from video he had posted on social media that appeared to show gunshots fired from the vantage point of an upper-floor window, with the misspelled label: “Shool shooting!”

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US rocked by three separate mass shootings over Easter weekend

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Two teenage boys killed in Pittsburgh in one of at least three shootings over the weekend, including two in South Carolina

Two teenage boys were killed and eight other people were wounded after gunfire erupted at a party in a short-term rental home in Pittsburgh early Sunday, one of at least three mass shootings across the US on Easter weekend.

The other two shootings – both in South Carolina – left a total of 18 people with bullet wounds, once again reigniting calls among advocates for meaningful gun control legislation.

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Police arrest man accused of killing Georgia coroner’s parents and son

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Jacob Christian Muse, arrested Friday night, faces charges of malice murder for killing three people at a local gun range

Police in Georgia have arrested a man accused of killing a local coroner’s parents and son during a robbery at the family’s gun range earlier this month, according to officials.

Jacob Christian Muse, 21, faces three counts of malice murder in the 7 April shooting deaths of Luke Hawk, 19; Tommy Hawk, 75; and Evelyn Hawk, 75, which rattled their rural community about 50 miles south-west of Atlanta.

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Brooklyn shooting: over 20 injured, including 10 shot, in subway attack

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Biden says ‘we’re not letting up until we find the perpetrator’ as manhunt under way for shooter

A gunman wearing a gas mask filled a crowded New York subway car with thick black smoke from a canister and opened fire on morning rush-hour passengers, injuring more than 20, including 10 with gunshot wounds.

A manhunt was under way on Tuesday after the shooter, described as a heavy-built Black male about 5ft 5in tall, wearing a green construction-type vest and hooded grey sweatshirt, fled the scene of the shooting. Officers were searching for a U-Haul truck with an Arizona license plate as of Tuesday afternoon, police told multiple media outlets, and the vehicle was later found.

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‘They knew the Lord’: Georgia coroner finds son and parents killed at gun range

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Family members of official killed in ‘senseless and tragic’ robbery and shooting in community near Atlanta

A Georgia coroner went to a shooting range owned by his family on Friday evening and found his parents and son had been shot dead in a robbery, officials said.

In a brief telephone interview with the Guardian on Sunday, Richard Hawk confirmed his 19-year-old son Luke Hawk, father Tommy Hawk and mother Evelyn Hawk were killed at the shooting range, which was owned by his father.

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Police determine at least five people fired shots in Sacramento shooting

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Three people have been arrested since the early Sunday violence unfolded but the motive is still unknown

Police have said at least five people fired weapons in a weekend shooting in Sacramento, California, that killed six people and injured a dozen others and prompted calls for lawmakers to address the scourge of gun violence in the US.

Officials said on Wednesday that while the motive was still unknown, investigators think “ gang violence is at the center of this tragedy” and that “gangs and gang violence are inseparable from the events that drove these shootings”.

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Sacramento: second suspect arrested over mass shooting that killed six

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Smiley Martin, 27, brother of first suspect Dandrae Martin, facing gun-related charges but neither brother charged with homicide

Police in Sacramento arrested a second person in connection with Sunday’s mass shooting in a bustling stretch of California’s capitol. Six people were killed in the shooting and at least 12 were injured.

On Tuesday the department announced Smiley Martin, who was also injured in the shooting, would be booked in Sacramento’s county jail once his medical care is complete. Martin, 27, is facing charges of possession of a firearm by a prohibited person and possession of a machine gun. His brother Dandrae Martin, 26, was arrested on Monday and charged with assault and illegal firearm possession offenses.

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Suspect arrested in Sacramento shooting that left six dead

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Police say they have received more than 100 videos or photos from the scene and have executed three search warrants

Police in the California state capital have made an arrest in connection with Sunday’s mass shooting that left six people dead and at least a dozen others injured. In the hours after the bloodshed, police say they have received more than 100 videos or photos from the scene and executed search warrants on three homes.

They identified a 26-year-old man as one of the individuals arrested in connection to the shooting, in a press release. He has been charged with assault and illegal firearm possession offenses.

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Sacramento shooting: police hunt at least two suspects after six shot dead

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Police in California ask for help in identifying those responsible for gunfire that broke out after ‘large fight’

Police in Sacramento, California, are hunting for at least two suspects after six people were killed and 10 others injured during a shooting in the city’s downtown early Sunday morning.

Kathy Lester, chief of the Sacramento police department, said at a news conference that police were patrolling the area at about 2am after hearing gunfire. When they arrived at the scene, she said, they found a crowd gathered on the street and six people dead.

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