A community leader and a retired Buffalo officer are among victims killed in racist shooting at supermarket

BUFFALO, N.Y. — Katherine Massey, a Buffalo native, spent her life fighting for her community and rebuilding the area surrounding Cherry Street, where she and members of her family lived. A mural was added to the neighborhood, and front yards are now decorated with giant trees because of her. In her spare time, she would go around and pick up trash and donate supplies to the local schools.

After she retired about five years ago from Blue Cross Blue Shield, she became the Cherry Street block club president, a title she took seriously.

"She did a lot, never stopped. She had a task a day," her niece Dawn Massey, 30, said. "She was so prevalent in the community. She was so adamant about her community, where her family resides."

Former Erie County Legislator Betty Jean Grant told The Buffalo News that Katherine Massey was a “powerful, powerful voice.”

Katherine often wrote articles for local newspapers, including the Buffalo Challenger, her family said. Last year, she wrote a letter to The Buffalo News pushing for more federal regulations of firearms. She wrote the letter after Erie County Legislator April Baskin's cousin died on April 24, 2021.

It "is another gut-wrenching account of the escalating gun violence in Buffalo and many major U.S. cities," she wrote.

Katherine, 72, was one of 10 people killed Saturday when a gunman opened fire at Tops Friendly Market in a racist rampage targeting Black people. Three other people were wounded. An 18-year-old white man is in custody.

Her brother, Warren Massey, said he dropped off Katherine at the grocery store shortly before the shooting began.

He said that he usually stayed with Katherine but that she told him to come back and pick her up. "I never thought that was the last time I would see her," he said.

Katherine, or Aunt Kat, as her family called her, was the family matriarch. She never had children of her own, but she was a mother figure to her nieces and nephews.

"She was the greatest person you will ever meet in your life," said her nephew Demetrius Massey, 39.

Dawn Massey added: "She would do anything for anyone. Very family-oriented. She was the closest extension of our grandmother."

Her family said they are still trying to process her death.

"I'm still using present tense," Dawn Massey said.

Demetrius Massey added, "It doesn't seem real."

Aaron Salter Jr., 55, a security guard at the grocery store, was also remembered as a beloved member of his community. Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia called him a "hero in our eyes."

Salter, a retired Buffalo police officer, fired at the gunman multiple times, but the bullets did not pierce the suspect's armor-plated vest.

Ruth Whitfield, 86, had just visited her husband at a nursing home and had stopped by Tops to pick up groceries when she was gunned down. Her son, retired Buffalo Fire Commissioner Garnell Whitfield, told The Buffalo News that she was "a mother to the motherless" and "a blessing to all of us."

"She inspired me to be a man of God and to do whatever I do the best I could do. I wouldn't have been able to do it without her," he said.

The family of Roberta Drury, 32, said she grew up in Cicero, New York, and moved to Buffalo about 10 years ago. She helped care for her brother, who is recovering from cancer.

"She enjoyed her time with her family, especially the yearly family trips to Wildwood, NJ," her family said in a statement Sunday to NBC News. "Our family is extra saddened that in the 10 years since Sandy Hook nothing has changed with gun violence."

For more than 20 years, Pearl Young ran a food pantry in the Central Park neighborhood to feed people every Saturday, according to reporter Madison Carr. Her family said in a statement to NBC News that she was a "worshipper" and "loved God."

"The Family of Pearl Young would like to say first and foremost that she will be truly missed," the statement read. "If there is one consolation that we can take from this tragedy is that we know that mom is up in heaven with our dad (her Ollie) and dancing and shouting with our heavenly father."

Other victims killed included Geraldine Talley, 62; Heyward Patterson, 67; Celestine Chaney, 65; Margus D. Morrison, 52; and Andre Mackneil, 53.

Mackneil's family said he was buying a cake for his 3-year-old son when he was killed.

Three people were wounded in the shooting: Jennifer Warrington, 50; Christopher Braden, 55 and Zaire Goodman, whose mother is a staffer for state Sen. Tim Kennedy. Goodman's mother, Zeneta Everhart, said the 20-year-old is "truly divinely protected" and is home recovering.

The suspect, Payton Gendron, of Conklin, New York, was arraigned Saturday evening in Buffalo City Court on one count of first-degree murder, the Erie County District Attorney's Office said. He is being held without bail, and a felony hearing was scheduled for Thursday morning, the office said.

Mayor Byron Brown said the gunman drove from hours away to carry out the attack. U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement that the Justice Department "is investigating this matter as a hate crime and an act of racially-motivated violent extremism."

CORRECTION (May 16, 2022, 10:12 a.m. ET): A previous version of this article misspelled the last name of wounded victim Zaire Goodman’s mother. She is Zeneta Everhart, not Erhart.