The original content of Democracy Now! Headlines appears under the Creative
Commons BY-NC-ND 3.0 License (United States). For more, including their other
shows and media, visit www.democracynow.org.
February 16, 2023

Buffalo Supermarket Shooter Gets Life in Prison Without Parole for Racist Massacre
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In Buffalo, New York, the white teenager who murdered ten people in a
racially-motivated attack in a predominantly Black neighborhood last May
has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
There were dramatic scenes in the courtroom Wednesday, as family members
of the victims confronted the gunman, who was just 18 years old when he
published a racist manifesto online before using a legally purchased
Bushmaster AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle to systematically seek out
and murder Black people at a supermarket. The killer live-streamed the
attack on social media. This is Barbara Massey, sister of shooting
victim Katherine Massey.

Barbara Massey: "You gonna come down to our city, decide you don't like
Black people. You don't know a damn thing about Black people. We're
human. We like our kids to go to good schools. We love our kids. We
never go to no neighborhoods and take people out."

Massey was interrupted as a man lunged at the convicted mass murderer.
He was restrained by court officers as the gunman was rushed from the
courtroom. The Erie County district attorney later said the man would
not be charged for the outburst. This is Simone Crawley, granddaughter
of shooting victim Ruth Whitfield, speaking during victim impact
statements.

Simone Crawley: "We all know the pure hatred and motivations behind your
heinous crime, and we are here to tell you that you failed. We will
continue to elevate and be everything that you are not, everything that
you hate, and everything that you intended to destroy. … We are
extremely aware that you are not a lone wolf, but a pawn of a larger
organized network of domestic terrorists. And to that network, we say,
'we as a people are unbreakable.'"

The mass murderer apologized, saying, "I don't want anyone to be
inspired by me and what I did."


.