BUFFALO, N.Y. — Fragrance Harris Stanfield, a customer service lead at Tops Friendly Markets in Buffalo, had just finished ringing up a customer Saturday when she heard gunshots outside the store.
Within seconds the front sliding doors opened and the gunfire moved inside as the store's security guard pulled out his weapon and returned fire. Harris Stanfield tried to grab her daughter, cashier supervisor Yahnia Brown-McReynolds, but she lost her grip. Thinking her daughter was following her, she dashed toward the back of the store to escape.
Brown-McReynolds, the new mother of a 7-week-old girl, instead ducked behind her register. She stayed crouched with her eyes closed until the gunfire stopped, she said in an interview Tuesday.
The shooting, which left 10 people dead three others wounded, has shaken the tight-knit group of employees. But some, like cashier Ashley Marks, are determined to return to work so they can continue to serve a community that fought hard to get its own grocery store.
Community 'anchor' was targeted
The gunman was dressed in tactical gear when he opened fire in the store's parking lot around 2:30 p.m. Saturday, fatally shooting three people and wounding an employee, before he entered the store and continued his rampage.
Among those killed was security guard Aaron Salter Jr., who has been hailed a hero for trying to stop the gunman. The wounded include employee Zaire Goodman, who was shot in the neck helping an older customer load groceries in her car.
Police said the suspect, who is from Conklin, New York, drove hours to Buffalo to carry out his attack. He was arrested at the scene without incident and arraigned on first-degree murder charges Saturday evening. He pleaded not guilty.
A document posted to Google Docs on Thursday night said he chose Buffalo because the city has the most Black residents and it was in his vicinity. Attorney General Merrick Garland said the Justice Department is investigating the shooting as a "hate crime and an act of racially-motivated violent extremism.”
Leonard Lane, 62, a Buffalo native, said the shooting was an attack on more than just a grocery store, describing it as the "anchor" of the community.
Henry Taylor, a professor of urban and regional planning at the University of Buffalo, said it took years to bring a Tops to the Masten Park neighborhood of Buffalo, which has limited access to grocery stores selling fresh goods at affordable prices. He noted that many people say still more stores are needed to serve the community.
If Tops doesn’t reopen, Taylor said, Black residents would have to leave their neighborhoods to get fresh produce, a significant hardship for the 40 percent of residents who don’t have cars.
Harris Stanfield, who started working for Tops in December, said her job was her way to give back to her neighborhood.
"I'm usually a part of a lot of the community organizations," she said. "This is my way of still giving some community service. Being here in the community and helping people and loving people is just what I love to do."
Marks, who began working at the store eight months ago, said it was her "second home away from home."
"We're not just co-workers. We are family," she said.
Employees ran for their lives; some had to hide
Harris Stanfield said she knew something was off Saturday afternoon before the gunfire started.
"My stress points started hurting. My neck was hurting to the point where I could barely touch it. It was so sensitive," she recalled. "As it got worse, I'm turning around to tell my daughter that I'm in pain and I'm not sure what's going on, maybe I should go and sit down or something. But I didn't get to tell her anything, because we heard gunshots."
She said everyone in the front of the store paused. When they saw Salter, the security guard, back up and start shooting, "it alerted us to run."
