According to court documents, white supremacist Payton Gendron, who in a racially motivated attack killed ten people and injured three at the Tops supermarket in Buffalo, New York, pleaded not guilty on Thursday to 25 counts of hate-motivated domestic terrorism and other charges in a grand jury indictment.
Payton Gendron appeared in court for an arraignment hearing before Erie County Court Judge Susan Eagan, who ordered the 18-year-old held without bond, according to local media. He is scheduled to appear in court again on July 7.
Authorities said Gendron was targeting Black people when he drove three hours from his home near Binghamton, New York, and shot 13 people with a semi-automatic, assault-style rifle at a Tops store in Buffalo on May 14, killing 10.
According to Buffalo News, on Wednesday, a grand jury charged him with a 25-count indictment. The first count of the indictment, domestic terrorism motivated by hate, accuses Gendron of carrying out the attack “because of the perceived race and/or color of such person or persons” who were injured and killed. The charge carries a life sentence penalty without the possibility of parole.
Read more: Payton Gendron Pleads Not Guilty To 1st Degree Murder Charge In Racial Mass Shooting
According to Erie County District Attorney John Flynn, Payton Gendron is the first defendant to face a charge under New York’s domestic terrorism hate crime law. The law was proposed in the aftermath of a mass shooting targeting Mexicans at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, and took effect on November 1, 2020.
Gendron is also charged with 10 counts of first-degree murder and 10 counts of second-degree murder, all of which are considered hate crimes. The grand jury, which decides whether there is enough evidence to bring a defendant to trial, also returned 3 counts of attempted murder as hate crimes and a single count of illegal weapon possession.
“When you hear the phrase, throw the book at someone, well, in this case, right here, the defendant just got ‘War and Peace,” Flynn explained, referring to Leo Tolstoy’s 1,200-page novel. The weapons charge stems from the shooter modifying the rifle to carry a larger magazine.
According to Reuters, Gendron’s attorney, Brian Parker is abiding by the court’s gag order and has no comment at this time. The shooting has reignited a long-running national debate about gun laws in the United States, and Payton, if convicted, will face a life sentence in prison without a chance for parole. Hopefully, that will deter white supremacists from enacting violence on Blacks.
