OLATHE, Kan. — Kansas reeled on Friday as a shooting at a bar, which left one Indian engineer dead and another injured, escalated into an international incident amid fears that the attack was motivated by bias and hate.
The authorities in the United States, including F.B.I. agents, are investigating the shooting as a possible hate crime, and India’s government expressed shock over the episode in suburban Kansas City.
In New Delhi, the episode raised new alarm about the treatment of foreigners in the United States, where President Trump has made clamping down on immigration and refugees from predominantly Muslim countries a central part of his “America First” agenda.
The attack occurred around 7:15 p.m. Wednesday at Austins Bar and Grill in Olathe, Kan., southwest of Kansas City.
At least one witness said that the gunman, identified by the authorities as Adam W. Purinton, 51, yelled “get out of my country” before opening fire, The Kansas City Star reported. A bartender at a Clinton, Mo., restaurant where Mr. Purinton was later captured said he had heard him say that he had killed two Middle Eastern men.
A 24-year-old American man who tried to intervene after he reportedly heard the gunman utter racist slurs was shot and hospitalized.
Citing judicial ethics and the continuing inquiry, investigators in the United States have offered no specifics about the allegations against Mr. Purinton, who was charged on Thursday with one count of premeditated first-degree murder and two counts of attempted premeditated first-degree murder. The federal government could ultimately try to bring civil rights charges against Mr. Purinton.
“Our role in this investigation is to work jointly with local law enforcement to determine if an individual’s civil rights were violated,” said Eric K. Jackson, the special agent in charge of the F.B.I.’s field office in Kansas City, Mo. “It’s not uncommon for hate crime investigations to be conducted jointly by the F.B.I. and local law enforcement and prosecuted under the state law.”
Mr. Purinton was jailed in Henry County, Mo., before his extradition on Friday morning. Stephen M. Howe, the district attorney in Johnson County, Kan., said Mr. Purinton’s bond had been set at $2 million.
Mr. Howe’s office did not immediately respond to a message on Friday. A spokesman for the Olathe Police Department referred questions to the prosecutor’s office.
In Johnson County, at least, Mr. Purinton has had few run-ins with law enforcement. Court records show a thin history: a speeding ticket in 2008 and a 1999 drunken-driving charge that was dismissed.
He spent time in the Navy and, according to a website where veterans can list their military record and find shipmate lists, he was deployed aboard the U.S.S. Long Beach, a missile cruiser, from 1988 to 1990. Mr. Purinton, who has held private pilot and control tower operator certifications, also worked for the Federal Aviation Administration, which he left in 2000, according to agency records and a spokeswoman.
The dead man, Srinivas Kuchibhotla, worked for Garmin, a GPS navigation and communications device company. The wounded Indian man, Alok Madasani, also worked for Garmin, according to the Indian government. The men were in their early 30s.
Many immigrants in the United States have been voicing concerns about the policies and language of Mr. Trump, who has ordered restrictions on immigration and a sped-up deportation process for undocumented immigrants. The F.B.I. reported an uptick in hate crimes in the United States last year.
Thousands of Indian technology workers have come to the United States under the H1-B program, which grants skilled foreign workers temporary visas. But the potential tightening of that program has raised concerns in India, where many young people dream of studying or working in the United States.
Dhruva Jaishankar, a foreign policy fellow at Brookings India in New Delhi, said that an isolated incident like the Kansas shooting would not affect the relationship between the United States and India. But if more attacks against Indians were to occur, or if the United States were perceived to not be taking such cases seriously enough, there could be a problem, he said.
India’s foreign minister, Sushma Swaraj, said on Friday on Twitter: “I am shocked at the shooting incident in Kansas in which Srinivas Kuchibhotla has been killed. My heartfelt condolences to bereaved family.” Ms. Swaraj said she had spoken to Mr. Kuchibhotla’s father and brother, who live in Hyderabad, India.
The Kansas attack dominated the Indian news media on Friday, with headlines calling the wounded American, Ian Grillot, a hero, and labeling the shooting a hate crime. In a video recorded at his hospital bed, Mr. Grillot said he had hidden under a table when the shooting began, then pursued the assailant, mistakenly thinking he was out of bullets. Mr. Grillot was shot in the hand and the chest.
“It wasn’t right, and I didn’t want the gentleman to potentially go after somebody else,” he said. “He did it once. What would stop him from doing it again?”
Mr. Grillot deflected praise.
“I’ve had a lot of people call me a hero, this, that and the other,” he said. “No, it’s not like that. I was just doing what anyone should have done for another human being. It’s not about where he’s from or his ethnicity. We’re all humans, so I just felt I did what was naturally right to do.”
Ms. Swaraj said that Mr. Madasani had been released from the hospital.
Mr. Madasani’s father, Jagan Mohan Reddy, a government engineer in Hyderabad, said by telephone that his family was “in a state of shock.” He said he did not know whether he would ask Mr. Madasani and another son living in the United States to leave the country.
“We have to think it over,” he said. “My sons are not new to America. They have been staying there for the last 10 to 12 years. This is a new situation, and they are the best judges.”
But as he recalled a visit from Mr. Madasani to India in 2014, Mr. Reddy pointedly said Mr. Trump’s policies and tone could be inciting violence. “At that time, he was not talking about any hate crime,” he said.
Reuters news service quoted a White House spokesman, Sean Spicer, as saying that the loss of life in Kansas was tragic but that it would be absurd to link the action to Mr. Trump’s rhetoric.
Mr. Spicer told reporters that it was too early to guess at the motive for the shooting.
Say a Prayer for the FBI don’t you think they need it.
My guess is the shooter is a Fox News-watching dumbass who thought he was knocking off a couple of Muslims.
Regardless of the actual reason, this notion of “hate crimes” is complete bullshit. Aggressive violence is aggressive violence. Killing someone because of his ethnicity, religion, or whatever, is no better or worse than killing him because you wanted to take his money. At the very least, these situations shouldn’t be treated any differently by the law.
“Regardless of the actual reason, this notion of “hate crimes” is complete bullshit.”
Exactly what I was going to say, BMF.
As if someone committing murder doesn’t hate the person they’re killing in one way or another. There IS no SEPARATE CRIME possible (except in Bizarro World), it’s part & parcel.
100% agree. This nonsense of hate crimes is a back door to stiffer penalties and more government overreach.
I take your response as yes the FBI needs a pray to keep from getting shot or worse. They are manufacturing hate against European Americans.
And it has the Government seal of approval.