The local authorities and the F.B.I., are investigating the shootings, in which eight people were killed, including six Asians.
At least eight people were killed and another person was injured when a man opened fire on Tuesday evening in three separate Atlanta-area massage businesses, in a northwestern suburb in the northeastern part of the city. A suspect was arrested about 150 miles south of Atlanta within hours of the shootings.
Six of the victims were Asian. The shootings put Asian communities across the United States on alert and prompted law enforcement officials to increase patrols. But the authorities in Atlanta said on Wednesday that they did not believe the shootings were racially motivated.
The gunman told them that he had a “sexual addiction,” and they said that he may have targeted spas he had visited in the past.
Here is what we know about the shootings.
What happened?
Around 5 p.m. Tuesday, the first shooting was reported at Young’s Asian Massage near Acworth, a suburb northwest of Atlanta, said Capt. Jay Baker of the Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office. Four people died and a fifth person, a Hispanic man, was injured. His condition is not yet known.
At 5:47 p.m., the Atlanta police responded to a report of a robbery at Gold Spa in the northeastern part of the city. The authorities found the bodies of three women with gunshot wounds. While they were at the scene, officers received a report of shots fired at the Aromatherapy Spa across the street, where they found the body of another woman.
Who is the suspect and how was he caught?
Around 6:30 p.m., the Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office released surveillance images of the suspect, wearing a black and red shirt and driving a black S.U.V. outside one of the massage parlors. The authorities urged people to call if they recognized the man or the vehicle.
About 90 minutes later, the sheriff’s office in Crisp County, Ga., about 150 miles south of Atlanta, received information that the suspect was traveling south on Interstate 75. Georgia State Patrol and Crisp County deputies spotted a black 2007 Hyundai Tucson around mile marker 101, the authorities said. A state trooper performed a maneuver, causing the S.U.V. to spin out of control. The driver was arrested without incident and was taken to the Crisp County jail.
The suspect, who is white, was identified as Robert Aaron Long, 21, of Woodstock, Ga. His family helped to identify him after images from surveillance cameras at nearby businesses were posted on social media, law enforcement authorities said.
A 9-millimeter gun was found in his vehicle, the authorities said. He is scheduled to be arraigned on Thursday, officials said.
The authorities said they did not believe that there was a racial motive for the shootings. Captain Baker said at a news conference that Mr. Long told law enforcement officials in interviews on Tuesday night that he had a “sexual addiction” and that he saw the spas as a temptation “that he wanted to eliminate.”
Mr. Long also told the authorities that he had planned to drive to Florida “to do similar acts in that state,” Captain Baker said.
6 of the 8 victims were Asian women
The identities of the victims have not been released. However, six of the people killed were Asian, and two were white, according to law enforcement officials. All but one were women. A Hispanic man was injured in the shooting at Young’s Asian Massage near Acworth. His condition is stable.
On Wednesday, an official from the South Korean consulate in Atlanta, citing the Foreign Ministry in Seoul, confirmed that four of the eight people who were killed were ethnic Koreans. But the nationalities of the four women were not immediately known, the official said.
Mr. Long acted alone, the authorities said.
What don’t we know yet?
The authorities on Wednesday were investigating what Mr. Long may have planned to do in Florida. As tragic as the shootings were, “this could have been significantly worse,” Atlanta’s mayor, Keisha Lance Bottoms, said on Wednesday.
The authorities were working on Wednesday to determine whether Mr. Long had obtained the gun legally.
Georgia’s Asian-American population has grown in recent decades. About 7.6 percent of residents in Fulton County, which includes Atlanta, are of Asian descent, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau.
No matter what Mr. Long’s motive was, Ms. Bottoms said the city wanted to provide resources and protection to Asians in the aftermath of the shootings.
Police departments in at least two American cities on Tuesday moved to increase patrols amid a rise in hate crimes targeting Asians.
The New York Police Department’s counterterrorism bureau said on Twitter that it would “be deploying assets to our great Asian communities across the city out of an abundance of caution.” On the West Coast, the Seattle Police Department said on Tuesday night that it would increase patrols and outreach to support the city’s Asian-American community.
Stop AAPI Hate, an organization that was formed to fight anti-Asian discrimination during the coronavirus pandemic, said on Twitter on Tuesday that there was a “great deal of fear and pain in the Asian-American community” and that the shootings were an “unspeakable tragedy.”
Nearly 3,800 hate incidents targeting Asian-Americans have been reported in all 50 states and Washington, D.C., since last March, the organization said in a new report earlier in the day.
The F.B.I. is assisting the local authorities in the investigation.
Reporting was contributed by Richard Fausset, Neil Vigdor, Sean Keenan, Azi Paybarah, Giulia McDonnell Nieto del Rio and Choe Sang-Hun.
"What" - Google News
March 17, 2021 at 09:08PM
https://ift.tt/3vBZKLy
What to Know About the Atlanta Massage Parlor Shootings - The New York Times
"What" - Google News
https://ift.tt/3aVokM1
https://ift.tt/2Wij67R
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "What to Know About the Atlanta Massage Parlor Shootings - The New York Times"
Post a Comment