‘We’ve seen this over and over again. I never thought this would happen in Buffalo,” Mark Talley said, holding up a photo of his mother, Geraldine Talley.
BUFFALO, NY — Families of people killed at a Buffalo supermarket expressed their grief and made anguished calls for action against racist violence Thursday, hours after the white man accused of massacring 10 Black people quietly appeared on the street. court to face a murder charge.
“I constantly think about what could have been done,” Mark Talley, son of Geraldine Talley, 62, said at a news conference with the Rev. Al Sharpton.
“It’s like Groundhog Day. We have seen this over and over again. I never thought this would happen in Buffalo,” Talley said, holding up a photo of his mother.
Raw emotions from relatives of several victims came hours after 18-year-old Payton Gendron briefly appeared in court wearing an orange jail uniform, mask and handcuffs. Assistant District Attorney Gary Hackbush said the first-degree murder indictment, which covers all 10 deaths, was filed Wednesday.
As Gendron was being led out, someone yelled “Payton, you cowardly!” from the courtroom gallery. He is being held in jail without bail.
Thirteen people in total were shot Saturday at Tops Friendly Market in a predominantly black Buffalo neighborhood. Authorities continue to investigate the possibility of hate crime and terrorism charges.
District Attorney John Flynn said his office would not comment on the case as the grand jury investigation continues.
Gendron’s attorneys also declined to comment, according to defense attorney Daniel DuBois.
Family members of several victims met privately with Sharpton before joining him at a news conference outside Buffalo’s Antioch Baptist Church. Sharpton said his civil rights group, the National Action Network, would cover funeral expenses for the dead.
“These hate crimes must stop,” Sharpton said. “We need to hold accountable everyone who has helped and abetted hate in this country.”
Sharpton said the gunman’s innocent victims “were guilty of being black.”
Gendron livestreamed the attack from a helmet camera before turning himself in to police outside the grocery store. Shortly before the attack, he posted hundreds of pages of writing on online discussion groups detailing his plans for the attack and his racist motivation.
Investigators have been examining those documents, which included a private journal he kept on the Discord chat platform.
At his initial court appearance last week, Gendron’s court-appointed attorney entered a “not guilty” plea on his behalf. He is due back in court on June 9.
Five days after the shooting, authorities announced Thursday that evidence collection at the supermarket was complete. Tops Market President John Persons promised to open the store as soon as possible, but said he couldn’t give a timetable.
The massacre at Tops supermarket was disturbing even in a nation that has become almost desensitized to mass shootings. All but two of the 13 people shot during the attack were black. Gendron’s online writings say he planned the assault after falling in love with white supremacist ideology that he encountered online.
Stephen Belongia, the top FBI agent in Buffalo, said agents were still working to piece together Gendron’s motives and how he came to his extremist views.
“An important part of these types of incidents is telling the full story that may not be heard in a courtroom at a later date: understanding, as much as possible, what this gunman’s motives are, how he became radicalized. him, what he was reading, where he was reading it, who he was inspired by, ”Belongia said at a press conference.
The diary says Gendron secretly planned his attack, without outside help, but Discord confirmed Wednesday that an invitation to access his private writings was sent to a small group of people about 30 minutes before the attack began.
Some of them accepted the invitation. It was not clear how many read what he had written or logged in to watch the assault live. It was also unclear if anyone tried to alert law enforcement.
New York Governor Kathy Hochul on Wednesday authorized state Attorney General Letitia James to investigate the social media platforms used by Gendron to determine if they were responsible for “providing a platform to plan and promote violence.”
In Buffalo on Thursday, Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia said social media users can also play a role by speaking up when they see people posting violent or threatening content.
“You need to get these people out,” he said at a briefing. “Expose those who are putting out those kinds of extreme views and let us eradicate them.”
Reference-www.wgrz.com