"A 52-year old man from Buffalo yesterday allegedly called up a pizzeria at 12:05 p.m. and made threatening comments to the employee, referencing what happened at Tops [supermarket]. 45 minutes later, allegedly, that same individual called up a brewery in downtown Buffalo and made similar threatening comments, again alluding to what happened at Tops," Flynn said during a press conference on Monday. "[Buffalo Police Department] did a great job, found out who this guy was, [and] went and arrested him last night."
Payton Gendron, 18, is accused of carrying out a mass shooting at a supermarket in Buffalo on Saturday, which left 10 people dead and three others injured.
The FBI qualified the incident as a racially motivated hate crime, given that the alleged shooter left a manifesto expressing white supremacist beliefs, including the Black Sun symbol used by Nazi Germany and neo-Nazi groups such as the Ukrainian Azov and other military units.
The 52-year-old was arrested for making threats referencing the shooting was held overnight and arraigned Monday morning on the charge of making a terrorist threat, for which he faces up to seven years in prison, Flynn added.