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GREENWOOD Dist — Days after the North Tulsa community was rocked by two seemingly random shootings at a library and gas station, Tulsa’s District Attorney is accusing the shooter, who is Black, of killing two men, who are white, due to their race. The DA has added hate crime charges.
Carlton Gilford, 61, was initially charged with first degree murder and shooting with intent to kill on April 24 after walking into the Rudisill Library on April 18 and shooting 35-year-old Lundin Hathcock in the back of the head.
He then reportedly walked over to the nearby Quiktrip gas station on Pine and Peoria, firing on 55-year-old James McDaniel in the head. Gilford shot the man again when he fell to the ground and fired at other employees in the gas station.
Days later, Tulsa District Attorney Steve Kunzweiler added a charge of malicious intimidation, Oklahoma’s equivalent of a hate crime charge.
“The information suggests that race played a role in it and I feel like that is something we can prove, and it is something that a judge or jury obviously needs to listen to. So we will present that information along with everything else,” Kunzweiler told KOTV.
The attack in North Tulsa comes just a month before the Greenwood community is set to commemorate the 102-year anniversary of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, when a city-sanctioned white mob burned, bombed and pillaged the wealthiest Black business district in the nation, dubbed Black Wall Street.
“Race played a role” in Tulsa shooting, DA Kunzweiler says
Gilford didn’t attempt to resist when officers arrived on the scene. He reportedly waited calmly and allegedly confessed to killing the two men.
“SUSPECT CHARGED WITH HATE CRIME,” Tulsa Police…
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