Ron DeSantis booed by mourners at Jacksonville vigil after racist shooting
Florida governor Ron DeSantis was heckled by mourners at a vigil held in Jacksonville for the three victims killed in a racially motivated attack.
Two men and a woman were killed on Saturday by a 21-year-old white man named Ryan Palmeter, who “hated Black people”. The victims were identified as Angela Michelle Carr, 52, Anolt Joseph “AJ” Laguerre Jr, 19, and Jarrald De’Shaun Gallion, 29.
As the governor began speaking at the vigil on Sunday, many members of a crowd of over a hundred people booed Mr DeSantis, forcing him to step back from the microphone.
Ju'Coby Pittman, a Jacksonville city councilperson who represents the neighbourhood where the shooting took place, stepped in and asked the crowd to listen.
The shooting took place at a Dollar General store just blocks from the historically-Black Edward Waters University.
Shortly before the gunman went on a killing spree, his parents called law enforcement to say they had found a manifesto. The gunman had reportedly called his parents ahead of the attack and told them to look at his computer.
Sheriff TK Waters described those writings as a “disgusting ideology of hate”.
