The racist shooter who killed ten people – all of them black – in a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, was sentenced to life imprisonment during an emotional trial that included an attempted assault on the defendant by one of those present. Payton Gendron, a 19-year-old who traveled more than 300 kilometers to carry out the massacre, apologized for his crimes before being sentenced.
“There is no place for you or your ignorant, hateful and evil ideologies,” Judge Susan Eagan said after sentencing him to spend the rest of his life in prison without the possibility of parole. “There can be no mercy for you, no understanding, no second chances. You will never see the light of day as a free man again.”
Gendron, who was just 18 years old when he carried out the massacre in May last year, entered the supermarket wearing a helmet, bulletproof vest, military gear and carrying an assault weapon. In addition to killing ten people, he seriously injured three others, who managed to survive the attack. The murderer, who pleaded not guilty after being arrested by the police, recorded everything on a camera to broadcast the execution live on social networks, part of his plan to promote his macabre conspiracy.
Shortly after his arrest, a racist manifesto came to light on the internet in which the author of the massacre refers to the theory of the “great substitution”, a conspiracy of far-right groups that speaks of the threat of white genocide perpetrated by immigrants of other races. The judge referred to the current of white supremacism as an “insidious cancer in our society and our country.”
Gendron limited himself to saying that he was very sorry and blamed the content he was consuming on the internet, which aroused shouting and insults from one of those present at the trial. Before the sentence was handed down, several of the relatives of the victims – between 32 and 86 years old – had the opportunity to testify. When Barbara Massey Mapps, 72-year-old sister of one of the deceased, did it, she could not contain her emotion with screams and harsh words towards the accused. At that moment, a man behind her began to run towards Gendron with the intention of attacking him, before being subdued by the policemen present in the room. “I understand the emotion and I understand the anger, but we cannot allow this in the courtroom,” the judge said.
Gendron did not wait to start leaving victims along the way. He got out of his car shortly after 2:30 p.m. and shot four people in the Jefferson Avenue parking lot, killing three and wounding one. He then entered Buffalo’s Tops Friendly Market supermarket and proceeded with the execution. “He was heavily armed,” said Buffalo Police Chief Joseph Gramaglia. “He had tactical gear, he was wearing a helmet” and a vest that prevented Aaron Salter Jr., a security guard and former local police officer, from stopping him.
According to the criteria of The Trust Project
