Police say 19-year-old Brandon Hole browsed White supremacist websites a year before the FedEx shooting, ABC News reported.
His mother contacted police on March 3, 2020. After he purchased a gun, Hole’s mother showed signs of concern for her safety and fears over his behavior.
She asked her son what he planned to do with the gun and he allegedly struck her in the arm with a closed fist. She reported he told her that, “he was going to point a recently purchased shotgun at police officers so they would shoot him,” according to CNN.
The Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department detained Hole, seized the weapon, put him on a mental health hold and transported him to a hospital for evaluation. Police reported that Hole said, “please just turn the power strip off on my computer” and “I don’t want anyone to see what’s on it”. According to a CNN report, one officer “observed what through his training and experience” were White supremacist websites.
Police notified the criminal intelligence unit and took the shotgun to the police department’s property room. The inventory sheet wrote, “seized by dangerous person”. Indianapolis police said that regardless of the mental health hold, Hole was able to legally purchase two assault rifles in July and September that same year.
The state’s Jake Laird Red Flag gun law allows police to seize and hold firearms from individuals with mental health issues. According to the law, the state has 14 days to file a petition that requests an individual to be designated as having a violent propensity or mental health instability.
“In this particular case, the petition was not filed because the family in this particular case had agreed to forfeit the firearm that was in question and they were not going to pursue the return of that firearm,” said Marion County, Indiana, Prosecutor Ryan Mears according to ABC.
Investigators are still looking into the motive of the shooting.
Today, the Sikh Coalition sent a letter to law enforcement officials urging them to investigate this as a possible hate crime.
“During the gunfire, Mr. Hole specifically aimed at the Sikh employees and made a concerted effort to avoid non-Sikhs,” the coalition says eyewitnesses told them.
The letter is addressed to Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Chief Randal Taylor and Paul Keenan, special agent in charge of the FBI.
The letter cites one eyewitness account in which Hole specifically “told a White woman running toward him to get out of the way just having shot a Sikh man in the face.”
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