HATE CRIME?

Neighbor: Kansas Shooting Suspect a ‘Drunken Mess’

Says suspect, who targeted immigrants, wasn’t a political person.

A longtime neighbor of the man who shot Indian immigrants at a bar in Kansas, killing one of them, says the suspect was a “drunken mess” who was not a political person. But witnesses to the shooting said the suspect, Adam Purinton, said, “get out of my country” before he opened fire, causing some to label the incident as a hate crime. Andy Berthelsen, a neighbor of Purinton for 15 years, said the 51-year-old’s mental state went “downhill very quickly” after his father passed away. Officials have declined to indicate whether they are investigating the attack as a hate crime. The second Indian man who was shot was released from the hospital shortly after the shooting, while a third man who attempted to intervene is still in the hospital recovering.