Federal prosecutors are looking into whether the Jewish community center shootings in Kansas on Sunday should be tried under the hate crimes statute.
Attorney General Eric Holder said in a statement on Monday that the Department of Justice was looking "determine whether the federal hate crimes statute is implicated in this case," according to The Wall Street Journal, Holder added that the DOJ would provide local prosecutors with "all available support."
If the decision to consider the shooting a hate crime is made, the case would become a federal one. Regardless Holder said, "No matter what, we will do everything in our power to ensure justice in this case on behalf of the victims and their families,"
The shootings occurred on Sunday afternoon both at a Jewish community center and a retirement community. Three people were killed, reports ABC World News. A man and his young grandson were shot at the center and a woman was killed at the retirement home.
The shooter has been identified as 73-year-old Fraiser Glenn Cross, Jr., whose real name is Frasier Glenn Miller. The Southern Poverty Law Center says that he is a former Klu Klux Klan leader.
CNN notes that he helped found the Carolina Knights of the KKK and the White Patriot Party. They were 1980s paramilitary groups, the SPLC said.
He will likely be charged with premeditated first-degree murder.