Echoes of Christchurch in murder manifesto

At least 29 people are dead in 24 hours of mass shootings as Donald Trump says violence must end.

A gunman wearing body armour killed nine people and injured 27 in a neighbourhood of bars and restaurants in Dayton Ohio, in the second mass shooting in the US in less than 24 hours and the third in eight days.

The gunman, identified by police as Connor Betts, 24, was killed by police. Among the dead was the shooter’s 22-year-old sister, Meghan, police said.

Connor Betts with his sister Meghan Betts. Picture: Supplied

The shooting began at just after 1am on Sunday in the Oregon District, a popular spot on weekends. Officers were “in the immediate vicinity when this shooting began and we were able to respond and put an end to it quickly,” the Dayton Police Department said. An officer told dispatchers the shooter was down less than two minutes after an initial report of shots fired, according to dispatch recordings archived by Broadcastify.

“As bad as this has been, it could have been much, much worse,” Assistant Police Chief Matt Carper said.

Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley said told a press conference that the shooter was wearing body armour and had a .223 caliber high-capacityrifle, with additional magazines.

The gunman, whose motive remains unclear, began firing into a crowded street from the parking lot of a bar called Blind Bob’s, said Andy Rowe, the bar’s manager. Mr Rowe said he arrived on the scene 40 minutes after the shooting and that witnesses told him the gunman was firing across the street to another bar called Ned Peppers.

The shooting came hours after a gunman opened fire in a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, killing at least 20 and injuring 26, some critically. A shooter killed three and injured 13 at the Gilroy Garlic Festival, in Gilroy, California, the Sunday before.

Authorities said they were interviewing dozens of witnesses. Police couldn’t say how many shots had been fired by the shooter, or police.

The victims included four women, ages 22 to 39, and five men, ages 25 to 57. The shooter studied psychology at Sinclair Community College in Dayton, and was initially enrolled in the fall of 2017, but wasn’t a current student, a college spokesman said.

Ms Whaley said investigators from the Federal Bureau of Investigation were on the scene.

“You never want to be the mayor that gets this call in the middle of the night,” she told CNN. “But you know that it’s likely, anywhere you go, it’s likely going to happen.

“And so unfortunately, this group of mayors that have had this happen to their communities continue to get bigger and biggeras every day goes on. Something has got to be done,” she said.

Trump: Hate has no place in our country

President Donald Trump this morning denounced the two mass shootings in Ohio and Texas, saying “hate has no place in our country.” Addressing reporters in Morristown, New Jersey, Mr Trump said “we’re going to take care” of the problem. He says he’s been speaking to the attorney general, FBI director and members of Congress and will be making an additional statement later today.

Mr Trump pointed to a mental illness problem in the US, calling the shooters “really very seriously mentally ill.” He says the problem of shootings has been going on “for years and years” and “we have to get it stopped.”

The Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit research group that counts mass shootings, lists the Dayton shooting as the 251st mass shooting of 2019. It defines a mass shooting as one in which four or more people were shot, not including the gunman.

James Alan Fox, a professor at Northeastern University who studies mass killings, said this weekend has been the deadliest in terms of mass shootings this year.

According to the AP/USA Today/Northeastern University Mass Murder Database that Mr Fox helps manage, there have been 22 mass killings in the US this year in which four or more people, excluding the assailant, have died from various forms of violence. Those killings include 18 mass shootings, six of which occurred in public locations.

Too often, Mr Fox said, one mass shooting can inspire another, leading to a cluster of shootings in quick succession as like-minded individuals are spurred to attack.

“There’s all those images of suffering: memorial services, people crying, cellphone videos of the gunfire. It plays right into the mind-set of a few people who would love to replicate that in their own community,” he said. “They do build on each other. There is a contagion effect.” From 2006 to 2016, the number of public mass shootings each year was relatively flat, with about four or a five a year, according to the mass-murder database. That number has jumped in recent years, with seven public mass shootings in 2017 and 10 in 2018.

“We’ve got at least two bad years here now,” Mr. Fox said. “I think the level of discord and hate in America is certainly a plausible hypothesis as to why.” All of those killed were on the street, police said. Gregory Semon with Miami Valley Hospital said some victims sustained multiple gunshot wounds, while others were injured trying to flee the scene.

Texas shooter inspired by NZ gunman

In Texas, the man is suspected of shooting dead 20 inside the crowded Walmart store was said to have been ruinspired by Australian Brenton Tarrant’s attacks in Christchurch, according to a “manifesto” police are closely ­examining

Tactical response officers arrive at the scene. Picture: AFP

In the racist document, purportedly posted by “P. Crusius” on the notorious 8chan message board before the shooting, the ­author goes as far as describing Tarrant’s own alleged manifesto as changing his view on who he should target in an attack.

Police in El Paso arrested 21-year-old Patrick Crusius of Allen, Texas, after a gunman — armed with an assault rifle and wearing earmuffs — opened fire at the busy store, killing at least 20 and injuring 26 others.

At least nine of the victims, including three of those killed, were Mexican citizens, that country’s President, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, said.

Authorities said between 1000 and 3000 shoppers — along with about 100 employees — were at the shopping centre, about 8km from the Mexican border, when the shooting took place.

Among those killed at the Walmart store was 25-year-old Jordan Anchondo, who was shot while trying to shield her two-month-old son from the gunfire, a relative said.

Her sister, Leta Jamrowski, said her nephew was hospitalised with broken bones after his mother fell on top of him when she was killed.

“From the baby's injuries, they said that more than likely my sister was trying to shield him,” Ms Jamrowski said.

Patrick Crusius. Picture: Heavy.

“So when she got shot, she was holding him and she fell on him, so that’s why he broke some of his bones.

“He pretty much lived because she gave her life.”

She said she had yet to find out whether her brother-in-law Andre Anchondo had survived the shooting.

Crusius was arrested without officers firing any shots, according to El Paso police chief Greg Allen.

“Right now, we have a manifesto from this individual that indicates to some degree a nexus to a potential hate crime,” Mr Allen said.

He said the scene was “a horrific one”.

It’s been reported that the Federal Bureau of Investigation has opened a domestic terrorism ­investigation into the shooting.

US President Donald Trump said the shooting was a cowardly and “hateful act”.

“Today’s shooting in El Paso, Texas, was not only tragic, it was an act of cowardice,” Mr Trump said in a Twitter post.

“I know that I stand with everyone in this Country to condemn today’s hateful act. There are no reasons or ­excuses that will ever justify killing innocent people.”

The racist document on 8chan is loaded with white supremacist rhetoric and rails against immigration and “race-mixing”, with the author making a series of racist statements about “Hispanics” and that the US was “rotting from the inside out”.

“In general, I support the Christchurch shooter and his manifesto,” the document begins, before defending the violent response taken by the author over his concerns about immigration.

People arrive to look for survivors evacuated from the Walmart to an El Paso school. Picture: AP

“My motives for this attack are not at all personal. Actually the Hispanic community was not my target before I read (Tarrant’s manifesto).”

The author went on to claim his views on immigration predated Mr Trump’s 2016 presidential election campaign.

“I putting (sic) this here because some people will blame the President or certain presidential candidates for the attack. This is not the case. I know that the media will probably call me a white supremacist anyway and blame Trump’s rhetoric.”

Tarrant is suspected of sharing his own manifesto on the same message board before using Facebook to live-stream part of his ­attacks on two mosques in Christchurch in March. Those attacks left 51 people dead.

Tarrant, 28, has pleaded not guilty to more than 90 charges — including 51 counts of murder.

El Paso police sergeant Robert Gomez said Crusius was speaking to officers but had not been formally charged.

With The Wall Street Journal