Assailant at large, motive for killing unknown. Â
By Deepak Chitnis
WASHINGTON, DC: An Indian man was shot to death in a convenience store in South Lake Tahoe, California, about two hours from the state capitol of Sacramento.
Manpreet Ghuman Singh, a 27 year-old native of Punjab, was killed by an unknown gunman while he was working as a clerk at the USA Gas Station convenience store on Tuesday night. The assailant shot Singh once in the chest area. Forensic results have not yet been released, but it is believed that Singh died almost instantly.
The gunman is believed to have acted alone, although the El Dorado County Sherriff’s office is as yet unable to identify a motive for the killing. A $4,000 reward is being offered by the Lake Tahoe Secret Witness Program — $1,500 from the office itself and an additional $2,500 from an anonymous benefactor.
Crimes against Indian-Americans, and Sikhs in particular, have increased in recent years. In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, some Sikhs were murdered by ignorant Americans who mistook them for Muslims and al-Qaeda sympathizers – including Balbir Singh Sodhi, in Phoenix, Arizona, the first victim of a hate crime following the terrorist attacks.
Last year, a white supremacist fired shots at a Sikh gurudwara outside Milwaukee, Wisconsin, killing six innocent people in the process. And last month, graffiti artists scrawled the word “Terrorist†on the wall outside a gurudwara in California.
Singh had just immigrated to the US two years ago, and was living with relatives in California. His body is being flown back to India at the end of the week, with a traditional cremation set to take place on Saturday.