In the US, a white racist on an important day for African Americans staged a massacre in a shopping center

On Saturday, August 26, a racist massacred a shopping mall in Jacksonville, Florida. A white man in his 20s walked into a Dollar General store and opened fire. He was wearing a bulletproof vest and armed with a pistol and a semi-automatic rifle.

The killer chose victims exclusively from African Americans. He managed to shoot two men and a woman before the police arrived. The shooter then committed suicide.

The massacre occurred on a day when the United States was celebrating the 60th anniversary of the so-called March on Washington and Martin Luther King Jr.’s famous “I have a dream” speech. Commemorative events were held across the country on August 26. It is noteworthy that the attacker timed the previous incident with the massacre of citizens to coincide with a significant date for Americans - US Independence Day.

Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan said, reports CNN, that the crime committed in her city “filled with racial hatred.”

The local sheriff T.K. Waters fully agrees with her. He called the store massacre “a crime motivated by racism”.

The sheriff said the shooter acted in private and initially planned to kill himself. The perpetrator lived in Clay County in Jacksonville with his parents. According to preliminary data, he wrote several manifestos, in particular, for his parents, the police and the media.

“Honestly, it was a maniac who decided he wanted to take the lives of other people. His target was a specific group - blacks. He directly wrote that he wanted to kill them, ”- reported by the sheriff.

The FBI launched a formal investigation into the “racially motivated hate crime.”

It is established that at first the killer was going to go to the territory of the historic Black University. This is the name in the United States of special higher educational institutions where African Americans study. It was there that the 60th anniversary of the March on Washington was held. But he was not missed. Then he went to the nearby Dollar General.

Earlier reported on the massacre in the city of Richmond, Virginia, where a 19-year-old youth opened fire on the participants and guests of the graduation ceremony.