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Virginia Shooter Suicide Note Cites Racism, Discrimination as Motives

© AP Photo / Keith SrakocicHollow point .45-caliber bullets.
Hollow point .45-caliber bullets. - Sputnik International
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The shooter, who killed two journalists during a live news broadcast on Wednesday, faxed a suicide note to ABC News describing racism and discrimination as primary motives behind his attack.

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — Vester Lee Flanagan, who killed two journalists during a live news broadcast on Wednesday, faxed a 23-page suicide note to ABC News describing racism and discrimination as primary motives behind his attack.

ABC News reported that they received a lengthy fax two hours before the Wednesday morning shooting from a man claiming to be Flanagan.

"The [South Carolina] church shooting was the tipping point…I’ve been a human powder keg for a while…just waiting to go BOOM!!!!" Flanagan wrote in the 23-page fax that he referred to as a "Suicide note for friends and family."

Alison Parker, Adam Ward - Sputnik International
Gunman Kills Reporter, Photographer on Live TV in US
On Wednesday morning, Flanagan fatally shot local WDBJ7 television station reporter Alison Parker and videographer Adam Ward before turning the gun on himself. Vicki Gardner, the director of the local Chamber of Commerce, was also seriously wounded.

Flanagan, known as Bryce Williams on air, wrote that his actions were a response to the racist mass-shooting in a historical African-American church in South Carolina on June 17.

"I put down a deposit for a gun on 6/19/15," two days after the church shooting, he wrote, stating that his "hollow point bullets have the victims’ initials on them."

In the manifesto, Flanagan outlines a list of grievances including claims that he suffered racial discrimination and sexual harassment when he was an employee at WDBJ7.

Virginia’s Franklin County Sheriff Bill Overton noted that the authorities have a copy of Flanagan’s lengthy suicide note and they are using it in their investigation of the incident.

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