White gunman driven by racial ‘hate’ kills 3 black people in Jacksonville, Florida
- The shooter entered a Dollar General store wearing a tactical vest, armed with an AR-style rifle and a handgun
- Manifestos discovered by the gunman’s family soon before the attack ‘detail the shooter’s disgusting ideology of hate,’ Jacksonville’s sheriff said
A gunman in Jacksonville, Florida driven by racial hatred shot dead three black people in a discount store on Saturday before killing himself after a stand-off with police, authorities said.
“He targeted a certain group of people and that’s black people. That’s what he said he wanted to kill. And that’s very clear,” Jacksonville Sheriff TK Waters told a news conference about the gunman, who was white and in his early 20s.
According to the sheriff’s office, the shooter, who has not yet been identified, entered the Dollar General store wearing a tactical vest, armed with an AR-style rifle and a handgun.
Manifestos discovered by the gunman’s family soon before the attack “detail the shooter’s disgusting ideology of hate,” Waters said, and at least one of the guns had hand-drawn swastikas on it.
The sheriff said the gunman committed the shooting because it was the fifth anniversary of when another gunman opened fire during a video game tournament in Jacksonville, killing two people before fatally shooting himself.