Newly revealed documents now show that Daniel Perry, who was convicted this month of murdering a Black Lives Matter (BLM) protester, regularly shared racist content in private and public messages.
Perry, 37, shot and killed Garrett Foster, 28, an Air Force veteran, at point-blank range after a brief confrontation at a downtown Austin protest in July 2020. Perry claimed that he feared for his life as Foster was legally carrying an AK-47, though eyewitnesses disputed Perry’s claims that Foster pointed his weapon at him.
Perry has not yet been sentenced and may face life in prison.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) has said that he wants to pardon Perry, who he believes was acting in accordance with “Stand Your Ground” laws.
The recently revealed messages show that Perry had talked about killing protesters before. In a 2020 Facebook post, he likened Black Lives Matter protesters to monkeys.
“I am a racist because I do not agree with people acting like animals at the zoo,” he wrote. “I was on the side” of the protesters, he said, until they “started with the looting and the violence.”
In a 2019 message, Perry said that it’s “to [sic] bad we can’t get paid for hunting Muslims in Europe.”
Some of the messages were presented at trial, including one from 2020 when he said he “might have to kill a few people on my way to work,” in reference to a nearby protest.
Other messages include talking about traveling to Dallas to shoot “looters” and racist and white supremacist memes.
Perry’s lawyers have appealed the guilty verdict.