Buffalo Shooting Latest: Accused Made Threat At School, Police Say

BUFFALO, NY — The gunman accused of killing 10 people Saturday during a shooting at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, was motivated by racial hatred, officials said.

Payton Gendron, 18, had previously threatened a mass shooting at his high school, officials told the Associated Press.

Authorities interviewed the parents of Gendron, who is accused in the shooting, Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia said at a news conference Sunday. The parents are cooperating but "distraught," according to Gramaglia.

Police are investigating a 180-page manifesto "at all levels of government," Gramaglia said. The manifesto identifies Gendron, who is white, by name as the gunman and details the plot of the shooting, officials told the Associated Press.

Gendron traveled three hours from Conklin, New York, to carry out the shooting, authorities said. He had staked out the supermarket prior to the shooting, and police believe this was a lone act, authorities said.

The manifesto espoused "replacement theory," a white supremacist belief that non-whites will eventually replace white people because they have higher birth rates, officials told ABC News.

Police also found Gendron was a frequent visitor of websites extolling white supremacist ideologies and race-based conspiracy theories and had extensively researched other mass killings, including the 2019 mosque shootings in New Zealand, and the man who killed more than 70 people at a summer camp in Norway in 2011, an official told the Associated Press.

The Tops supermarket where the shooting occurred is in a predominately Black neighborhood, about 3 miles north of downtown Buffalo. Of the 13 people who were shot, 11 were Black, authorities said.

After the then-17-year-old made the shooting threat at his high school, he was brought in for a mental health evaluation afterward, Grimaglia said.

President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris both offered their condolences to victims and their families in separate statements Sunday.

Recent acts of violence and intolerance are evidence of an "epidemic of hate" across the country, Harris said.

"We must call it out and condemn it," Harris said. "Racially motivated hate crimes are or acts of violent extremism are harms against all of us, and we must do everything we can to ensure that our communities are safe from such acts."

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul called on political leaders in both parties Sunday to come up with solutions for racially motivated gun violence.

"This is a time to value people's lives, and that's what I'm expecting," Hochul said.

With Tops closing in the wake of the shooting, it leaves a food desert in the predominately Black neighborhood. To help area residents, ride share companies Uber and Lyft are offering rides out of the neighborhood to other grocery stores, Hochul said.

The Associated Press contributed reporting.