Buffalo Tops Massacre
On May 14th, 2022 a 18 year old white supremacist and domestic terrorist, Payton S. Gendron, massacred 10 people at Tops supermarket in the Cold Springs neighborhood on the East Side of Buffalo, N.Y. Gendron drove roughly 200 miles from his hometown to Cold Springs, and targeted majority Black community. He visited Tops numerous times and deliberately chose it as his target knowing it was the only major grocery store for a community existing in a food desert. Gendron murdered 10 people, and injured 3, with a military style Bushmaster XM-15 assault rifle while streaming part of his attack on Twitch. Gendron drafted an ultra-nationalist, racist manifest that spoke about the Great Replacement theory - the delusion that the white race is being replaced by people of color. He emulated part of his attacked after New Zealand’s Christ Church, and even wrote racial slurs on his rifle. Police officers arrested him without shooting Gendron, convincing him to drop his secondary weapon.
The victims, lovingly remembered by their community are: Roberta A. Drury of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 32, Margus D. Morrison of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 52, Andre Mackneil of Auburn, N.Y. – age 53, Aaron Salter of Lockport, N.Y. – age 55, Geraldine Talley of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 62, Celestine Chaney of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 65, Heyward Patterson of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 67, Katherine Massey of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 72, Pearl Young of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 77, Ruth Whitfield of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 86.
This is a honest documentation of the community of Cold Springs in the days following - Photographed for The New York Times.
Kicia “Cold Spring’ mourns in front of the victims memorial by Tops. She cried out, “ It’s never gonna stop, it’s never ever gonna stop,” speaking about the numerous racially motivated killings and mass shootings that have taken place over the past few years.
Community members gather for a prayer during a vigil.
A crowd outside of Delavan Grider Community Center, as President Biden's gives his speech inside on May 17, 2022
Mural near Tops of the 10 people killed on Jefferson Ave.
Taisiah Stewart, survivor of the massacre. Stewart witnessed people get killed by the shooter and then managed to escape through a back exit and run home.
Stewart was at the store front when he witnessed a woman fall over after being shot, he recalls, saying he “saw the bullets going in her.” He begins to run to the rear of the store, fumbling through aisles dropping things out of his book bag and his shoes sliding off. Once he found the exit, he ran home barefooted, suffering splinters in his feet and bleeding. At this time Stewart was not even aware that a mass shooting was taking place, and had to make a search on the internet to learn the news what a gunman had deliberately open fired in an act of pure, racially motivated evil. His first thought was, “ I came in contact with my worst fear - a White man with a gun, to come after me…because of my skin color.”
President Biden and First Lady visit memorials surrounding Tops. They stayed for roughly 10 minutes.
President Biden leaves after his visit to the Jefferson Ave Tops
Volunteers unload food to donate to the community. The Tops was a necessary resource for the neighborhood of Cold Spring and those around it, and without it the community is struggling with access to a fresh produce supermarket. Tops Friendly Market is working to reopen the store soon after renovations and a partial reconstruction. Some members of the community feel it should be replaced by a memorial, or a different supermarket, but Tops is keen on staying at the Jefferson Ave location. Their plan on returning will not only provide food, but other necessities like pharmacy services.
