An Ohio man is being held on charges related to the car crash that left one dead and 19 injured in Charlottesville, Va., in the wake of of a white supremacist rally, authorities say.
James Fields Jr., 20, is being held at the Albermarle-Charlottesville County Regional Jail on suspicion of second-degree murder, malicious wounding and failure to stop in an accident that resulted in death.
A jail official confirmed Fields was being held there Saturday evening.
Obama's Justice Department would already be all over this.
Trump's?
Maybe not so much.
Assuming authorities are right and this was intentional rather than some weird accident and we are not surprised with some unexpected alternative motive, this young man is almost certainly a white nationalist who killed people because they wanted statues of his heroes taken down, people who opposed what he loved and rejected his entire agenda.
It was a hate crime, then, and, given the apparent political occasion and motives - to protest, stop, and deter the removal of public statues celebrating heroes of the Confederacy and its cause - , an act of terrorism.
Too, if he wasn't there to visit his grannie or his high school sweetheart, it seems likely he drove to Charlottesville, Virginia from Ohio in the first place to participate in these racist demonstrations, possibly with the expectation and intention of participating in violence, though perhaps without any intent to kill or, specifically, to drive into a crowd.
All those details are yet to emerge.
But even now it is likely to have been outright, right-wing, racist terrorism, strictly speaking.
Where is the Justice Department?
Update, MSNBC says the FBI and the Justice Dept are on this, now, conducting a "civil rights investigation".
Update.
Charlottesville crash suspect James Fields brandished shield for Vanguard America hate group before attack
That's him in the middle.
More here on him and his victim.
He told his Mom he was going to an alt.right rally.
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