In March 2020, Navy mother Brandon Hole contacted police because she was concerned about her behavior after buying a weapon, according to details recently released by the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department (IMPD). She told police she told him she was “going to aim a newly acquired shotgun at police officers to shoot her.” And when police went to his home, he noted that he had visited websites of white supremacists, according to the report.
In an attack that lasted only a few minutes, Hole fired at the facility near Indianapolis Main Airport before claiming his life on Thursday night. Of the eight people killed in the violence, four were members of the Sikh community in the area, Maninder Singh Walia, a member of the Sikh community in Indianapolis, told CNN on Friday.
The case has also raised concerns about access to weapons, as Hole’s weapon was confiscated in the 2020 incident.
After his mother told officers on March 3 that he feared for his safety after his son bought a gun the day before, the IMPD arrested Hole, grabbed the gun, put him in a temporary depot immediate mental health and took him to a local hospital for evaluation, the police report said.
When Hole got to the handcuffs, he worried and said, “Please turn off the computer’s power outlet” and “I don’t want anyone to see what’s there,” according to the report. One officer, who was described as an upstairs cleaner and shotgun insurer, “observed what through his training and experience” were websites of white supremacists, according to the report.
Limitations of red flag laws
Despite the temporary suspension of mental health in March, Hole was able to legally purchase assault rifles in July and September 2020, Indianapolis police said.
The case “illustrates the limitations” of state law, according to prosecutor Ryan Mears in Marion County, Indiana, on Monday.
Because Hole’s house-taken shotgun had been secured and the family did not want it back, prosecutors found they “achieved” the law’s goal, Mears said. Had the state filed a petition, the court could have determined that prosecutors did not have the legal authority to keep the weapon.
“In this particular case, the petition was not filed because the family in this particular case had agreed to lose the weapon in question and were not going to pursue the return of that firearm,” Mears said.
Mears said the state had no access “to anything that indicated (Hole) had a history or had a documented diagnosis of mental illness.”
“We have 14 days under the statute and, because we have 14 days, our ability to have access to significant medical records, meaningful mental health records, is very limited.” Indiana law allows a person 30 days to respond to a subpoena, Mears said.
“The sad reality is that during the pending of these matters there is nothing to ban someone from buying a firearm, that is just the sad truth,” Mears said.
8 dead and 4 people still hospitalized
On Friday night, Indianapolis police released the names of the eight dead victims. They were Matthew R. Alexander, 32; Samaria Blackwell, 19; Amarjeet Johal, 66; Jasvinder Kaur, 50; Jaswinder Singh, 68; Amarjit Sekhon, 48; Karli Smith, 19; and John Weisert, 74.
Four people were hospitalized Monday with injuries sustained during the attack, FedEx said.
This sentiment was echoed in a letter addressed to the Biden administration on Saturday, in which the Sikh Coalition wrote: “It was no coincidence that the shooter went to this particular FedEx facility where he had worked and knew he was overwhelmed by Sikhs “.
Two of the victims, Sekhon and Kaur, were relatively new to Indianapolis and were working night shifts at FedEx facilities when they were killed, said Rimpi Girn, an Indianapolis resident who knew them.
Sekhon, after emigrating to the United States in 2004, moved to Indiana in 2019 from Ohio to be closer to family and relatives, said Girn, a close friend of the family. Sekhon leaves a husband and two children, ages 13 and 19, Girn said.
Kaur, who emigrated to the United States in 2018, was the breadwinner of her family, according to Girn. Sekhon drove Kaur to work because Kaur did not have a driver’s license, Girn said.
The fund said 100% of the donations “will go to families and those affected by the tragedy.”
Contributing Kristina Sgueglia, Meridith Edwards, Harmeet Kaur, Eric Levenson, Steve Almasy, Dakin Andone, Jason Carroll, Meredith Edwards, Jason Hanna, Kay Jones, LaCrisha McAllister, Evan Perez, Shimon Prokupecz, Hollie Silverman, Artemis Moshtaghian and Amanda Watts. this report.