Suspect arraigned in shooting of three Palestinian American students in Vermont

VERMONT – The suspect in the shooting in Vermont of three college students of Palestinian descent over the weekend pleaded not guilty to three counts of attempted second-degree murder on Nov 27 and was ordered by a judge to be held without bond.

The suspect, Jason J. Eaton, 48, appeared at an arraignment at the Chittenden County Criminal Court in Burlington via a remote video feed from the county jail, where he has been held since his arrest on Nov 26.

Police say Eaton used a pistol to shoot the three victims on the street near the University of Vermont in Burlington on the evening of Nov 25 and then ran away.

The attack is also under investigation as a suspected hate-motivated crime.

At the time of the attack, two of the men were wearing a keffiyeh, the traditional black-and-white chequered scarf commonly worn in the Middle East, police said.

Dressed in an orange jumpsuit at the three-minute hearing, Eaton responded “Yes, sir”, when asked by the judge if he understood the charges against him.

Burlington police and the mayor's office will hold a news conference on Nov 27 to discuss the incident and arrest.

The shooting came amid a rise in anti-Islamic and anti-Semitic incidents reported around the United States since a bloody conflict between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas erupted on Oct 7.

All of the Vermont victims are 20 years old; two are US citizens and the third is a legal US resident, police said.

The victims were reported to have been speaking Arabic when attacked, according to the Institute for Middle East Understanding, a non-profit pro-Palestinian advocacy organisation.

It also said the assailant opened fire on the three men after he began to shout at and harass them. Police say he fired four shots without saying a word.

Burlington Police Chief Jon Murad said in a statement earlier: “In this charged moment, no one can look at this incident and not suspect that it may have been a hate-motivated crime.”

Mayor Miro Weinberger said the indication that the shooting could have been motivated by hate is “chilling”, and the possibility is being prioritised by the police.

‘Elevated global threat environment’

US Attorney-General Merrick Garland said on Nov 27 that the US Department of Justice is assisting the local authorities in the investigation and trying to determine if it was a hate crime.

“No person and no community in this country should have to live in fear of lethal violence,” Mr Garland said ahead of a separate meeting at the department's Southern District of New York office.

Mr Garland cited the ongoing “elevated global threat environment” and the “sharp increase in the volume and frequency of threats against Jewish, Muslim and Arab communities across our country since Oct 7” for the understandable fear in communities across the country.

Families of the victims issued a joint statement on Nov 26 urging the authorities to investigate the shooting as a hate crime, as did the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), a US-based advocacy group.

“The surge in anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian sentiment we are experiencing is unprecedented, and this is another example of that hate turning violent,” ADC national executive director Abed Ayoub said.

The families identified the victims as Mr Hisham Awartani, a student at Brown University in Rhode Island; Mr Kinnan Abdel Hamid, a student at Haverford College in Pennsylvania; and Mr Tahseen Ahmed, who attends Trinity College in Connecticut.

All three are graduates of the Ramallah Friends School, a private Quaker secondary school in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, the families said.

Two of the students were visiting the home of the third student's family in Burlington for the Thanksgiving holiday.

Police said all three remained under medical care on Nov 26, two with gunshot wounds in their torsos and one shot in the lower extremities.

“Two are stable, while one has sustained much more serious injuries,” police said. REUTERS