A 36-year-old man who reportedly feared Asian people was arrested Tuesday and charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon for a May 11 shooting that injured three women at a Koreatown hair salon in Dallas.
Jeremy Smith is accused of entering the Hair World Salon and opening fire with a .22-caliber rifle, Police Chief Edgardo Garcia said Tuesday. Smith, who is Black, is jailed and no bond has been set. Jail records do not list an attorney for him.
Three of the seven people inside the salon were shot, Garcia said.
“One victim was shot in her right forearm, one was shot in the foot and another was shot in the lower back,” the chief said.
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The FBI confirmed to USA TODAY on Tuesday that it has opened a federal hate crime investigation in partnership with federal prosecutors in Texas and the U.S. Department of Justice’s civil rights division.
Smith’s girlfriend told authorities that whenever Smith is around an Asian American, “he begins having delusions that the Asian mob is after him or attempting to harm him,” according to the arrest warrant affidavit.
She told detectives Smith has had such delusions since being involved in a car crash about two years ago with a man of Asian descent, according to the affidavit. She said he was also fired for “verbally attacking” his boss, who was of Asian descent.
Investigators say Smith left the scene of the Hair World Salon shooting in a maroon minivan – later identified as a 2004 Honda Odyssey – that appeared similar to one seen in recent attacks against Asian-American-run businesses in the close-knit Korean community known as the Asian Trade District, the police department wrote on its blog.
Authorities have not officially linked Smith to the additional incidents or made arrests in those cases, Garcia said.
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On April 2, witnesses said a burgundy vehicle drove past a strip mall of Asian-run stores as the driver fired shots, according to police. That shooting occurred on Royal Lane, where the owner of Hair World Salon, Chang Hye Jin, operates her business.
Hye Jin was one of the women shot last week.
A day before her salon was riddled with bullets, a person – again driving a burgundy-colored vehicle – shot into a business 25 minutes away from Hair World Salon. The three people in the shop’s rear were uninjured, authorities said.
Investigators have since concluded the three acts of violence could be connected.
Police took Smith into custody Monday on active warrants for questioning. A search of Smith’s minivan uncovered a handgun, a gun magazine and ammunition, Garcia said.
Hair World Salon is still listed as temporarily closed on Google. Hye Jin told NBC News that the shooting felt like a hate crime.
“It especially feels targeted because he didn’t even demand money,” Hye Jin said, as reported by NBC News. “He just came in to shoot people.”
Community members of Korean descent pleaded for extra protection Monday night at a Korean-American safety town hall meeting hosted by Dallas Police.
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One of the women who was injured spoke at the meeting to a small crowd, hiding her face behind a mask and glasses. She said via a translator that she continues to deal with trauma and grief, but feels happy to have the community’s support, CBS Dallas/Fort Worth reported.
“We need a more safe place!” said one man passionately into the microphone at his turn to speak.
At Tuesday’s news conference announcing Smith’s arrest, Garcia acknowledged the “pain, frustrations and fear” he heard from community members at the town hall.
The Dallas Police Department announced in a statement its plans to utilize camera trailers in certain areas and every patrol has been asked to ramp up high-visibility patrols in parts of the city where the Asian population is more prominent.
Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson last week called the potential hate crimes “deeply disturbing,” stating that hate has no place in the city.
“I want our city’s Asian American community – which has appallingly faced increasing vitriol in recent years – to know that the City of Dallas and the people of Dallas stand with them,” Johnson said in a statement.
Contributing: The Associated Press