国际英语新闻：U.S. holocaust museum shooter charged with murder

WASHINGTON, June 11 (Xinhua) -- The man who shot a security guard dead in the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. was charged with murder on Thursday.

    The capital police chief, Cathy Lanier, told a press conference that the suspect, James von Brunn, "is officially being charged at this point with murder as well as killing in the course of possession of a firearm in a federal facility."

James W. Von Brunn is seen in a photo obtained from his website after law enforcement sources confirmed that the white supremacist was involved in a shooting at the U.S. Holocaust Museum in Washington, June 10, 2009.

The 88-year-old resident from Maryland walked into the museum on Wednesday afternoon and opened fire on African-American guard Stephen Tyrone Johns, 39. He was shot by two other guards and remains in critical condition in hospital.

    According to acting U.S. attorney Channing Phillips, von Brunn faces life in prison without parole and could even face a death sentence if he is convicted.

    Authorities said that von Brunn has a racist, anti-Semitic website and wrote a book titled "Kill the Best Gentiles," and he was convicted in 1983 of attempting to kidnap members of the Federal Reserve Board.

A U.S. Park Police officer on horseback patrols the scene outside the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum (R) after a shooting inside the museum in Washington, June 10, 2009.

Federal Bureau of Investigation, which is working with the U.S. attorney's office and the Department of Justice on the case, said that it is still reviewing if civil rights and hate crime charges can also be brought against von Brunn "as an anti-Semite and a white supremacist who had established websites that inspired hatred against African-Americans, Jews and others."

    The FBI agents has searched von Brunn's home in Maryland and the car he parked in front of the museum before the attack, gathering several pieces of evidence, said the bureau.

    At the White House several blocks away from the museum, U.S. President Barack Obama said in a statement that he was "shocked and saddened" by the shooting.

    "This outrageous act reminds us that we must remain vigilant against anti-Semitism and prejudice in all its forms," he added.

    Mayor Adrian Fenty praised at a Thursday press conference that the heroism of "not only of our fallen officer Johns, but all of the officers ... whose efforts yesterday to bring this gunman down so quickly, literally saved the lives of people."

    "There were thousands of people inside the holocaust museum and one life lost is a tragedy, but this could have been much, much worse," Fenty said.