Clark’s grandparents, David and Deborah Clark, also spoke to the outlet from outside their home, expressing shock over the incident. They said that they are “trying to process this,” and added that they are “very sorry for what happened.”
The grandparents declined to comment further and walked back inside their home. Police are treating the shooting as a hate crime.
One of the teens had taken a firearm from their parents’ home and left a suicide note that included writings about racial pride, multiple law enforcement officials briefed on the shooting told CNN.
Hate speech was also scrawled on one of the weapons used in the shooting, the officials said. They did not say what was written.
San Diego Police Chief Scott Wahl said investigators had discovered evidence that the suspects had participated in “generalized hate rhetoric.” Officers had already been searching for one of the teens before the shooting unfolded.
Police found the bodies of the shooters in a car nearby (Image: AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
His mother had contacted the police because she was concerned that her son, who had disappeared, could be suicidal, Wahl explained. Weapons were missing from their home and the mother’s car had vanished, he noted.
The search became even more frantic when police discovered that he was wearing camouflage and accompanied by an acquaintance, which they noted was odd for someone contemplating suicide, he said.
Authorities used every available technology to locate the teens, including automated license plate readers. Police sent officers to a mall near where the vehicle had been tracked, and notified a school where at least one suspect had previously attended, Wahl said.
As officers questioned the teen’s mother about where he might have gone, police began receiving reports of gunfire at the mosque. Officers arrived within four minutes of receiving the call, Wahl said.
As they arrived at the scene, gunshots rang out several blocks away where a landscaper was targeted but escaped unharmed. Clark and Vasquez were discovered dead inside a vehicle stopped in the middle of a nearby road, he added.
