Mass shooting suspect said he did it to clean up Philadelphia neighborhood: report

The man accused of fatally shooting five people in Philadelphia Monday night told police he carried out the shooting to clean up the neighborhood, two law enforcement sources told CNN.

Authorities are now looking into a since-deleted social media believed to have belonged to the shooting suspect, 40-year-old Kimbrady Carriker, that featured several posts about guns, the “loss of freedoms” and the Second Amendment, according to a source. The page’s most recent public post, made at 10:49 a.m. ET Monday, included a video ad for a tactical weapons accessories company that showed a man in tactical gear holding what seemed to be a military-style rifle. The suspect also shared posts in May from pro-gun groups that supported the Second Amendment and former President Donald Trump.

Another social media post from last month featured a video mocking a speech by President Joe Biden, captioned with Carriker’s belief that Biden was trying to “take our arms.” another post from the same June day read” “The only thing more terrifying than blindness is being the only one who can see.”

At a news conference, Philadelphia Assistant District Attorney Joanne Pescatore told the press that other witnesses said Carriker had been displaying “abnormal behavior for quite a while,” adding his housemates “thought he was getting more and more agitated as the days were passing.”

Carriker was arraigned on charges of murder, attempted murder, assault, reckless endangerment and weapons charges, and ordered to remain in custody without bail in a court hearing Wednesday. Officers arrested Carriker during a foot chase, authorities said, and the accused gunman, who appeared to have fired randomly along several blocks of southwest Philadelphia’s Kingsessing neighborhood, was wearing a bulletproof vest and had an AR-style rifle, a 9mm handgun and a scanner that tracks emergency response radio traffic. Assistant District Attorney Bob Wainwright said it appears only the rifle was used in the shooting.

The attack is one of at least 350 mass shootings to have occurred in the country so far this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive.