Who is Patrick Crusius? Race and age explored as suspect gets 90 life sentences for targeted El Paso Walmart shooting 

Patrick Crusius, a mass shooter who killed 23 people at an El Paso Walmart in 2019, was sentenced to 90 consecutive life terms by a federal judge on Friday, July 7, 2023. The horrific incident, described as one of the deadliest attacks targeting Latinos in modern US history, occurred on August 3, 2019.

At the time, a then 19-year-old Patrick Crusius from Dallas drove more than 700 miles overnight to El Paso and carried out a bloody rampage in Walmart with the sole intention of killing Hispanic people and Mexican immigrants.

Authorities said that out of 23 people killed in the store, at least eight were Mexican nationals. The suspect’s motive for the killing was found in his manifesto An Inconvenient Truth, which was posted on the anonymous discussion board 8Chan just before the shooting.

Authorities said that the racially-motivated killing that the suspect termed “ethnic replacement” stemmed from Crusius’s white supremacist belief that Mexican immigrants were carrying out a “Hispanic invasion” of Texas and had to be stopped.

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Patrick Crusius is a White gunman who targetted Latinos in the 2019 mass shooting spree

Patrick Crusius, a White gunman who is now 24 years old, was given 90 life sentences for each of the 90 federal charges, including hate crimes and firearms offenses. The sentencing comes in the wake of the 24-year-old entering a plea deal with federal prosecutors in February 2023.

The deal took the federal death penalty off the table in exchange for a guilty plea. However, the state prosecutors could still pursue the death penalty.

CNN reported that during Friday’s sentence hearing (which lasted roughly 40 minute) that Crusius showed no emotion. The suspect’s attorney, Joe Spencer, told the court that Crusius, who supposedly has a severe mental illness, took responsibility for his actions. Spencer asked the judge for some leniency in the sentencing. He said:

“Patrick will leave prison in a coffin. The only question is, will it be in God's time or man’s time?”

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What we know about Patrick Crusius' parents

Patrick Crusius with his father and two siblings

Meanwhile, the suspect's parents, John and Lori Crusius, were not present in court while their son was sentenced to 90 consecutive life sentences.

In February 2023, the suspect’s parents, John and Lori Crusius, who divorced in 2011, issued a statement condemning their son's actions that they said were “influenced and informed by people we do not know, and from ideas and beliefs we do not accept or condone.”

Patrick Crusius, who was raised in the northern suburbs of Dallas, went to Liberty High School in Frisco, Texas, before transferring to Plano Senior High School. He graduated from the latter in 2017.

The suspect’s father, John Bryan Crusius, is a therapist at Dallas Addiction Recovery Therapy. The suspect's mother, Lori Lynn Crusius, works as an admissions nurse for a hospice facility.

Per multiple reports, shortly before the suspect went on a deadly shooting spree, his mother, Lori, called the police expressing concerns about her son’s possession of a weapon.

Lori was reportedly concerned if her son was mature enough to safely handle the AK-47-style rifle that was found in his room.

At the time, the police reportedly assuaged her fears by stating that it was legal for her son to have the gun. A few weeks later, Patrick Crusius killed 23 people with the weapon.