The suspect in the mass shooting at Tops on Jefferson Avenue is due in court Thursday for a felony hearing. But there are two things that may happen before then, absolving the need for the felony hearing.
"I expect that he'll be indicted, but I also expect that the Department of Justice and the Assistant United States Attorney General Trini Ross will bring federal charges, federal hate crime charges, against the suspect. It carries the death penalty," New York Attorney General Letita James said.
7 News Legal Expert Florina Altshiler said she expects the federal case and state case will move forward concurrently.
"Different charges, that's why they can happen concurrently. The federal case would be for federal hate crime charges. The reason for the federal case happening is the federal government can do things that the state government can not," Altshiler said.
In New York State, there is no death penalty. The highest level of punishment is life without the possibility of parole.
"However, in a federal case, if they chose to, they could go forward to see the death penalty," Altshiler said, "I think if we look at other cases to see what the federal government has done, for example the Boston Marathon bomber case, yes. I would expect them to seek the death penalty."
The defense withdrew its request for a competency evaluation, so the state case will proceed with the suspect considered competent to stand trial, if there is a trial. There's the possibility of a plea deal, but Altshiler said that's unlikely.
"In a case as egregious as this, I would not expect the District Attorney's Office to offer him any breaks at all," Altshiler said.
In addition to federal and state criminal proceedings, there will likely be numerous civil lawsuits.
"There's possibility for liability for the person and shop that sold the weapon. There's a possibility for liability of the medical center who potentially breached a duty of care and released this criminal defendant early," Altshiler said.
One of the guns that law enforcement discovered in the suspect's car was a gift from the his father. Altshiler said depending on the evidence, his parents could be held legally accountable as well.
"In this case, we don't know yet. I'm certain they're looking into the parents. They are investigating what if anything the parents knew," Altshiler said.
There is also potential liability for those who failed to follow New York's Red Flag Laws.
"If someone makes a murder suicide threat, as this individual did, the person would be red flagged and should not be able to purchase a weapon here. That didn't happen," Altshiler said.
Altshiler said the state's Red Flag Law could have prevented this mass shooting.
"This is where I say there's a lot of room for civil liability in this case. If people do what they're supposed to do, potentially this could have been prevented. But because people did not do what they were supposed to do, because people were negligent in allowing this to happen, it did happen," Altshiler said.
Source: WKBW news, Staff, May 16, 2022
Payton Gendron ID’d as gunman in racially motivated mass shooting at Buffalo’s Tops supermarket
A “heavily armed ” white teenager clad in military-style tactical gear slaughtered ten people Saturday in a “racially motivated” mass shooting he live-streamed at a Buffalo supermarket, authorities said.
The shooter — identified by law enforcement as 18-year-old Payton Gendron — drove from “hours away” in Conklin, New York, to a Tops Friendly Market on Jefferson Avenue, in a predominantly black neighborhood, officials said.
Eleven of the victims were black and two were white.
“We are investigating this incident as both a hate crime and a case of racially-motivated violent extremism,” said Stephen Belongia, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Buffalo field office said during a press conference.
The shooter, who sources said had the N-word scrawled in white paint on one of his weapons, arrived at the market at around 2:30 p.m. He “was very heavily armed. He had tactical gear on. He had a tactical helmet on,” Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia said.
He also had a camera to livestream the shooting, Gramaglia said. He was armed with a semiautomatic rifle, a hunting rifle and a shotgun which were all purchased legally, NBC News reported, citing a senior law enforcement official.
The gunman opened fire in the parking lot, killing three people and injuring a fourth, he said.
He then went inside the store, where he encountered longtime “beloved” security guard and former Buffalo cop Aaron Salter, Jr., who tried to stop him, Gramaglia said.
The guard’s bullet couldn’t pierce the attacker’s armor, he said.
The shooter opened fire on Salter, killing him, Gramaglia said, before allegedly working his way through the rest of the store.
Buffalo cops confronted the shooter, who at one point put his gun to his own neck before authorities were able to talk him into surrendering, officials said.
The gunman was arraigned on Saturday night, surrounded by police when he appeared in court masked and wearing a white paper jail gown. He was slapped with first-degree murder charges and his court-appointed lawyer entered a not guilty plea, local media reported.
Gendron was reportedly placed on suicide watch, and is due back in court Thursday. His “distraught” parents were cooperating with authorities, NBC reported.
“The shooter was not from this community. The shooter traveled hours to this community to perpetuate this crime on the people of Buffalo,” Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown said.
The bloodshed occurred in the middle of a Saturday afternoon when many people were doing their grocery shopping.
The store’s operation manager told the Buffalo News she thought she heard 70 shots.
She saw the shooter and said, “He looked like he was in the Army.”
Two people who saw the gunman leaving the store described him as wearing camouflage attire with a black helmet.
“He was standing there with the gun to his chin. We were like what the heck is going on? Why does this kid have a gun to his face?” said witness Braedyn Kephart.
Kephart said the man dropped to his knees, ripped off his helmet and let go of his gun and then was tackled by police.
One regular shopper at the market told a local television station that he knew several of those killed.
“I lost three people today that I know and talk to five, six times a week. One, a friend of over 30 years, another a friend of 20 years. This is insane,” the man said.
The supermarket chain tweeted a statement saying it was “shocked and saddened by this senseless act of violence.”
It’s not the first time Gendron has come to the attention of law enforcement, according to The Buffalo News, which reported the teen had allegedly threatened his fellow high school students in June 2021.
A school official reported Gendron “had made statements indicating that he wanted to do a shooting, either at a graduation ceremony, or sometime after,” a source told the news outlet.
State Police investigated, and Gendron was referred for counseling and a mental health evaluation, The Buffalo News said.
Gov. Kathy Hochul called the suspect a “white supremacist” at a Saturday evening briefing in Buffalo before vowing to take additional steps to crack down on illegal weapons while increasing social media monitoring by law enforcement, hours after suggesting to the Post that she did not foresee more anti-crime legislative action this year.
“Yeah, I’m angry. I’ve seen violence from guns on the Brooklyn subway. Now, in the streets of Buffalo, it has to stop. It has to stop … We had already planned to be announcing a comprehensive gun package to address further loopholes that exist in our laws. We’re doing everything we can to ensure that our laws are tight,” Hochul said at the Buffalo press conference.
The New York State Hate Crime Task Force would also investigate the incident, she added.
Source:
nypost.com, Melissa Klein and Jesse O’Neill, May 14, 2022
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"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." -- Oscar Wilde
