A man with a stick attacked four homeless people in downtown Miami early Thursday morning, killing two and injuring two others in what the police called a horrible “display of unprovoked violence.”
The man was seen attacking the people with a stick at 6 a.m., the Miami Police Department said in a statement. The police responded soon after calls came in and saw a man who matched the description that had been given. He ran off but was arrested after a brief foot chase, the police said.
Two of the homeless people died at the scene of the attack. The two people who were injured were taken to a nearby trauma center for treatment, the police said. Their conditions were not available.
On Friday, the authorities identified the man who was arrested as Brenton Clarke, 36, of Inwood, N.Y., on Long Island. They said he had been charged with two counts each of first-degree murder and attempted first-degree murder, and a single count of armed robbery with a deadly weapon. The motive for the attack was not immediately clear, the police said.
Manuel A. Morales, the chief of police for the Miami Police Department, said at a news conference on Thursday that the suspect did not have an arrest history in Miami, but he has had “minor criminal run-ins with the police” in New York.
“This is a horrible incident,” Chief Morales said.
The Miami-Dade County Homeless Trust, the county’s leading homeless outreach group, said in a statement that it was grieving the “senseless loss of these lives.” and thanked the police for their swift response.
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