by Mike Donoghue
BURLINGTON — A Burlington man, charged with three counts of attempted second degree murder in the wounding of three Palestinian college students visiting Vermont over the Thanksgiving weekend, told federal agents, “I’ve been waiting for you” when they came to his home on Sunday, court records show.
Jason J. Eaton, 48, of 69 North Prospect Street then told the special agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives that, “I’d like a lawyer” during his short verbal exchange with them at the apartment house near the University of Vermont campus.
Eaton declined to his name during his encounter with ATF at about 3:40 p.m., but he did match the general description provided by the three victims in the unprovoked attack. ATF Special Agents Sam Brown and Eric Brimo took Eaton, who was shaking, into custody about 21 hours after the shooting, officials said. Eaton was transported to the Burlington Police Department where he continued to refuse to offer any relevant comments.
A subsequent court-ordered search of Eaton’s apartment uncovered several firearms, including a Ruger .380 pistol, and special ammunition made by Hornady with a bright red tip on each projectile, Burlington Police said. Tests conducted by the ATF showed the seized handgun was used to wound the three students, records show.
The ATF also determined Eaton legally purchased the handgun at the Powderhorn Outdoor Sports Center in Williston on April 6, Burlington Detective Cpl. Krystal A. Wrinn in court papers.
While many government officials and local residents have said they believe the shooting is a hate crime, Eaton is not charged under Vermont’s hate crime statute. His silence when confronted by the ATF agents appeared to have an impact on the decision not to charge the case as a hate crime.
The gunman never uttered a word before opening fire shortly before 6:30 p.m. Saturday.
Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George said negative comments sometimes made by criminal defendants during the course of a crime or shortly after help prosecutors prove the extra element of a hate crime charge.
In a statement from the shooting victims’ families, they have said, “We call on law enforcement to conduct a thorough investigation, including treating this as a hate crime.”
Little is known about Eaton, Burlington Police Chief Jon Murad said during a brief question-and-answer period at the end of a limited news conference. Eaton, who lived alone, used to reside in the Syracuse, N.Y. area, he said. The chief said he thought Eaton has been in Vermont since the summer, but he does have a traffic ticket from 2016 or 2017. Police had no indication of any religion for Eaton, Murad said.
Earlier in the day, Eaton said little during his court arraignment, which lasted about 90 seconds.
He is charged with wounding the trio of 20-year-old students:
— Hisham Awartani, a student at Brown University had a shot lodged by his spine and faces a long recovery.
— Tahseen Aliahmad, a student at Trinity College, was shot in the upper right chest and remains in pain.
— Kinnan Abdalhamid, a student at Haverford College in Pennsylvania had a bullet pass in and out of his right buttock.
A family relative said different spellings for the names of the students have appeared in the media, but he attributed it to translation issues.
The three young men were in Burlington visiting a relative of one of the students on North Prospect Street. The men reported they had gone for a short walk to have a cigarette when a man walked toward them, police said. No words were exchanged, and the man pulled out a black handgun from about two yards away Awartani reported when interviewed at the hospital, Wrinn said in a court affidavit.
Abdalhamid reported he saw the gunman on the porch of a white house and he was staring at the trio, Wrinn said. The man stumbled down the stairs and began shooting, Wrinn said.
All three victims gave the same general description of a young white man, average to skinny size, about 5 feet 10 inches, short with some facial hair, and possibly a scruffy beard. He was wearing a gray zip-up sweatshirt and dark pants.
The shooting happened about 3 blocks south from the Ohavi Zedek Synagogue — near the University of Vermont main campus.
During the court hearing, Superior Court Judge A. Gregory Rainville agreed to continue to hold Eaton without bail at the Northwest State Correctional Facility in St. Albans Town.
Rainville also approved a request by a public defender for a hearing on the state’s motion to hold without bail filed by Chief Deputy State’s Attorney Sally Adams. Rainville said the hearing would be held within in a few days, subject to the defense being ready.
The court hearing attracted national and international news reporters, including NBC, ABC, CBS, Fox News, MSNBC, Reuters and the New York Times.
Eaton, who appeared by video from the state prison, had been ordered jailed without bail early Monday on three counts of attempted second degree murder based on a lodging affidavit by Wrinn, records show.
Burlington Police had classified the case as three counts of aggravated assault, according to its news release Monday.
It was unclear what sparked the extra interest of the two ATF agents, Brown and Brimo, for Eaton on Sunday afternoon.
When the head of the ATF in Vermont was asked at the news conference if it was experience, training or something else that caused their interest to increase, U.S. Attorney Nikolas “Kolo” Kerest cut off the ATF boss and said he would field the question. Kerest then indicated he would not answer it. Kerest failed to respond when asked why he was muzzling the ATF and later told Vermont New First that there was an agreement on who would be allowed to speak at the press conference.
No charges have been filed by the U.S. Attorney in Vermont, but there is considerable national and international interest. U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland has said the Justice Department is investigating whether it is a hate crime.
Burlington Mayor Miro Weinberger offered an apology for starting the noontime news conference late, but he said he was on the phone with President Joe Biden discussing the shooting case.
Weinberger, who is considering a run for governor, did not offer any specific details about the phone call.
One of Weinberger’s staff members later motioned for him to end the press conference after about 15 minutes of limited questings from the media, which helped fill the Contois Auditorium at Burlington City Hall.
Murad, Weinberger, George, Kerest and two relatives of the victims had made about 25 minutes of opening remarks, including the shock and sadness the shooting has caused and the outpouring of support the families have received.
About a half dozen top federal law enforcement officials, including from out of state, were invited to stand up front at the news conference, but none were given a chance to talk about the efforts of their agencies in assisting in the case. They included the head of the ATF for New England, who traveled from Boston, and the two top ranking special agents from the FBI in Albany, N.Y., which oversees Vermont.
The 3 wounded students had graduated from Ramallah Friends School, a Quaker-run private nonprofit school in the city of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, according to the school.
Husam Zomlot, the Palestinian ambassador to the United Kingdom, posted on X about the incident, also naming the students and identifying them as “three young Palestinian men.”
He said the students were headed to a family dinner in Burlington when shot about 6:25 p.m. Saturday.
“Their crime? Wearing the Palestinian keffiyeh. They are critically injured,” Zomlot posted. Keffiyeh is an Arab kerchief or scarf worn as a headdress.
“The hate crimes against Palestinians must stop. Palestinians everywhere need protection,” Zomlot wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Two victims were found at the shooting scene and were attended to by neighbors that heard the shots and came outside to help. The third student fled through backyards and was found nearby — behind 77 Mansfield Avenue. He asked a neighbor to call 911.
At least two of the victims were wearing Palestine scarfs known as keffiyehs on their heads at the time of the shootings.
ATF special agents were called to the scene to help the short-staffed Burlington Police. The FBI also later joined the investigation.
Members of the Chittenden County Violent Crime Task Force, which was formed by the ATF earlier this year because of the large number of Burlington area shootings, several of them gang-related, also were called out. The task force is staffed by members from the ATF, state police, game wardens, state motor vehicle enforcement inspectors, and local police officers from municipal departments, including South Burlington and Milton.
A Vermont Fish and Wildlife warden with his K-9 was among those searching the crime area and appeared to pick up a trail for a short distance, but later lost it. The K-9 team also reportedly located the unused bullet in the grass near Eaton’s residence.