The white supremacist gunman who fatally shot 10 Black shoppers at a Buffalo supermarket last year was removed from a sentencing hearing on Wednesday after an enraged man tried to attack him.
Payton Gendron, 19, pleaded guilty in November to 10 counts of first-degree murder, three counts of attempted murder, one count of domestic act of terrorism motivated by hate, and one count of weapons possession for a May 14, 2022, mass shooting at Tops Friendly Markets. Three people survived the shocking rampage, which Gendron livestreamed on the internet.
Gendron posted a manifesto online that laid out his desire to eliminate Black people and preserve a white nation, citing other racist murderers as inspiration. He said he selected the Tops in Buffalo, a three-hour drive from his hometown of Conklin, because the neighborhood it was in was largely Black. To carry out the mass shooting, Gendron donned body armor and a tactical helmet, then opened fire using a semi-automatic rifle adorned with bigoted messages and symbols.
On Wednesday, emotional family members of Gendron’s victims addressed him in court.
“We love our kids!” Barbara Massey, whose 72-year-old sister, Katherine, died in the shooting, shouted at an orange-jumpsuited and bespectacled Gendron. “We never go in no neighborhoods to take people out!”
With that, a man in a gray sweatsuit rushed toward Gendron as bystanders pleaded, “Don’t do it!” He was intercepted by court security before he got into striking range, and Gendron was escorted out.
“You don’t know what we’re going through,” someone yelled as Gendron was hurried away.
A few minutes later, Gendron was brought back into the courtroom and the hearing continued.
“We cannot have that in the courtroom,” Erie County Court Judge Susan Eagan said. “We must conduct ourselves appropriately because we are all better than that.”
The state charges against Gendron could put him in prison for the rest of his life. He is also facing pending federal charges, for which he could face a death sentence.