Buffalo gunman ‘plotted attack for months’ | First Thing

Online posts apparently by 18-year-old suspect Payton Gendron show plans to livestream attack on Black people. Plus, who owns Einstein?

Good morning.

The white gunman accused of the massacre of 10 Black people at a Buffalo supermarket wrote as far back as November about staging a livestreamed attack on African Americans. He also practised shooting from his car and traveled hours to scout out the store in March, according to diary entries he appears to have posted online.

What's happening to Gendron? He surrendered and was arraigned on a murder charge over the weekend. He pleaded not guilty and was jailed under a suicide watch. Federal authorities are contemplating bringing hate crime charges.

How about Chou? He is expected to appear in state court today and it was not immediately clear whether he had an attorney who could speak on his behalf. A federal hate crime investigation is also ongoing.

Are Finland and Sweden going to join Nato? They want to but Turkey has said it will not approve their membership. Recep Tayyip Erdoan, the Turkish president, said the countries should not bother sending diplomatic delegations to try to persuade them.

What's happening at the Mariupol steelworks? More than 260 Ukrainian soldiers, many of them wounded, have finally been evacuated from the besieged Azovstal steel plant, appearing to cede control of the city to Russia after 82 days of bombardment.

What else is happening? Here's what we know on day 83 of the invasion.