Feds Investigating Whether Retired Federal Law Enforcement Officer Had 30 Minute Notice Prior to Race-Driven Buffalo Mass Shooting

It is perversely American to be writing about a very recent mass shooting, still fresh in the minds of Americans, still under investigation, but having to carefully delineate “which” mass shooting one is addressing. The investigation of the “Buffalo mass shooting,” the one associated with the racial manifesto and racial motivation, now includes the possibility that a retired federal agent had a thirty-minute “heads up” or awareness of the impending attack but did nothing. It is stunning that “doing nothing” is also a significant concern in the “Uvalde mass shooting.”

According to the Buffalo News:

Law enforcement officers are investigating whether a retired federal agent had about 30 minutes advance notice of a white supremacist’s plans to murder Black people at a Buffalo supermarket, two law enforcement officials told The Buffalo News.

Authorities believe the former agent – believed to be from Texas – was one of at least six individuals who regularly communicated with accused gunman Payton Gendron in an online chat room where racist hatred was discussed, the two officials said.

Not one single American should be shocked that a former law enforcement agent was an active member of a racist chat group. That the same person was aware of an impending attack and did nothing is, perhaps, “newsworthy,” but still, not shocking. Indeed one is forced to at least ask whether the fact that nearly every child in the Uvalde school was “brown” (Hispanic) had anything to do with why we see so many pictures of white police officers standing outside, waiting. Uvalde remains nothing but unanswered questions.

Back to the report on the Buffalo mass shooting:

The two law enforcement sources with direct knowledge of the investigation stated these individuals were invited by Gendron to read about his mass shooting plans and the target location about 30 minutes before Gendron killed 10 people at Tops Markets on Jefferson Avenue on May 14.

It is very difficult to charge someone with a crime for a failure to act unless one is a sworn active agent-officer or in the military, where there are times that dereliction of duty can become a criminal charge. A more pertinent question and perhaps one reason that the investigation remains ongoing is that if the agent provided the Buffalo shooter any advice, any tips, or shared any knowledge of law enforcement procedures, at that point one might look at conspiracy charges.

But for now, we await answers heartened, at the very least, that this investigation turned up the relationship and could thus perhaps stop similar incidents in the future.