The mother of El Paso's gunman, worried, had called the police to warn her that he had an assault rifle weeks before he sowed death in this southern US city. This is what his lawyers told CNN.
She said she had concerns because of her 21-year-old son's age, lack of maturity, and experience handling weapons, said Chris and Jack Ayres. An agent told him that his son being of age, the situation was not illegal and the conversation was concluded without leaving his name or that of his son, they said.
Indicted for murder, he faces the death penalty
Weeks later, the young man opened fire with an assault rifle in a hypermarket in El Paso, Texas, killing 22 people, including at least seven Mexicans. Before the carnage, he posted an anti-immigrant manifesto denouncing a "Hispanic invasion of Texas." Arrested, he has been charged with murder and faces the death penalty.
According to Chris Ayres, the mother was looking for information and not necessarily to sound the alarm. "He was not an explosive kid, with erratic behavior," he told CNN. His crime occurred Saturday morning, and thirteen hours later another gunman shot dead nine people in a bustling area of Dayton in the northern United States. This double drama has, as after each bloodbath, reopened the debate over firearms, responsible for nearly 40,000 deaths in the United States in 2018 (including suicides).