The suspect of a mass shooting that resulted in 22 dead at an El Paso Walmart last August was charged in a 90-count hate crime indictment on Thursday, opening the suspect up to the death penalty if convicted.
The Justice Department said on Thursday that Patrick Crusius, 21, posted a four-page racist manifesto, “The Inconvenient Truth,” on 8chan just prior to the shooting, claiming that “this attack is a response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas.” The document also said he drew inspiration from mass shootings at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, last March, which resulted in 51 dead and 49 injured.
“Now, in the 2020s, we face a resurgent threat of violence motivated by race,” John Bash, the U.S. attorney for West Texas, said in a press conference announcing the charges, later tweeting, “Our team is committed to obtaining justice for the victims of this horrific hate crime and act of domestic terrorism.”
The nine-page indictment made public Thursday evening charges Crusius with 22 counts of hate crimes resulting in death, 23 hate crimes involving attempted murder, and 45 counts of discharging a firearm in connection to the hate crimes. Following a trial, the suspect could face life in prison or capital punishment if Attorney General William Barr pursues it. Barr directed the federal government to resume executions last year.
“We are vindicating the important federal interest in stopping crimes that are motivated by hatred of a particular group of people,” Bash said.
“Today, we and the grand jury allege that the defendant committed federal hate crimes and that he committed these violent crimes to frighten and intimidate the Hispanic community,” Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division Eric Dreiband said. “This hate crime may be considered an act of domestic terrorism, as have other hate crimes throughout our history, like the violence wrought by white supremacists and the Ku Klux Klan.”
The indictment said that Crusius purchased a Romanian-made semi-automatic rifle online on June 19, 2019, along with 1,000 rounds of hollow point ammunition. Weeks later, the indictment alleges, Crusius drove overnight over 650 miles from Allen, Texas, to a Walmart Supercenter in El Paso on Aug. 3, 2019, where he opened fire and gunned down nearly two dozen people. The shooter surrendered to police and admitted he’d been targeting Hispanics.
“We will not tolerate hate-fueled violence in our communities,” FBI Director Christopher Wray testified to the House Judiciary Committee earlier this week. “I’ve elevated the racially motivated violent extremists threat to the same national threat priority, along with ISIS and homegrown violent extremists.”
Jaime Esparza, El Paso County’s district attorney, announced in August that Crusius would be charged on the state level with capital murder and that he would also be seeking the death penalty. Crusius pleaded not guilty to those state charges and will face the new DOJ charges in federal court next Wednesday.
