Buffalo supermarket shooting suspect expected to plead guilty in court next Monday

Suspected Buffalo supermarket shooter Payton Gendron is due in an Erie County courtroom Monday morning for an appearance in which he is expected to plead guilty to the charges against the state.

An initial hearing for Gendron’s planned plea change was canceled due to the storm dropping several feet of snow on parts of western New York.

Gendron is charged in a 25-count indictment with committing an “act of hate-motivated domestic terrorism” as well as 10 counts of first-degree murder, 10 counts of second-degree murder as a felony hatred, three counts of attempted murder as a hate crime and one count of criminal possession of a weapon.

Gendron fatally shot 10 black people at the Topps supermarket “based on the perceived race and/or color” of the victims, according to the indictment.

Gendron became the first defendant to be charged under the state’s relatively new Domestic Hate Terrorism Act, which was passed in 2020 by the then government. Andrew Cuomo. It followed the El Paso Walmart shooting that targeted Latinos. The statute is named after Josef Neumann, who was stabbed to death at a rabbi’s home during Hanukkah 2020.

“This charge carries only one sentence if the defendant is convicted of this charge: life in prison without parole,” Erie County District Attorney John Flynn said as the indictment accusation has been made public.

The accusation against Gendron mirrors white supremacist rhetoric and invective found on social media posts linked to him, including a belief in the racist conspiracy theory known as Substitution.