Deadly Violence at San Francisco Pride

[Trigger warning for violent homophobia.]

In a development in a story that isn't getting much national media attention for reasons I can't imagine (ahem), Ed Perkins, the man who was arrested on suspicion of firing seven shots into a crowd Saturday night at a San Francisco Pride event, killing 19-year-old Stephen Powell and injuring two others, has been released after investigators determined that "none of the seven shots fired into the crowd were from Perkins' weapon, and no witnesses were able to put Perkins at the scene," even though he was only in custody because "he was found near the crime scene in possession of a .357-caliber revolver."

(Of course, we all know that "near the crime scene" has a different definition when the suspect is a man of color, which could explain the seeming discrepancy.)

Earlier, police had believed Perkins to be one of at least two people involved, which was underlined by two more people being shot at the vigil for the first victim. But now police have released Perkins and are classifying the follow-up violence as a retaliatory gang shooting.

The picture that's emerging seems to be that Powell was killed (by members of his gang? a rival gang? a homophobic neighbor's or friend's or family member's gang?) for attending a Pride event, and things escalated from there in the way that gang violence tends to do. But at the root of it is this: Someone seems to have killed Stephen Powell because he was, or they believed him to be, gay.

The killer remains free.

[H/T to Cait.]