The man who shot and killed former NFL player Joe McKnight on Thursday afternoon was taken into custody only be released without charges overnight.
McKnight was 28-years old. The man who shot him, Ronald Gasser, is 54.
McKnight played college football for USC and then competed for the New York Jets from 2010 through 2012. He played two games for the Kansas City Chiefs in 2014
According to The New York Times, the incident occurred just before 3 p.m. Thursday and appears to be the result of an altercation tied to road rage, but Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand made clear the investigation is in its earliest stages. He rejected any attempt to tie the incident to race. McKnight was black, Glasser is white. When asked if the shooting was being investigated as a hate crime, Normand said, “Everybody wants to make this about race. This isn’t about race.”
McKnight was shot “in the hand, shoulder, and chest.”
The Times-Picayune reported that the shooting occurred “at the intersection of Behrman Highway and Holmes Boulevard.” And they quoted “a witness, who declined to give her name, said she was leaving a store in the area when she saw a man at the intersection yelling at another man, who was trying to apologize. The man who was yelling shot the other man more than once.”
Sheriff Normand said this scenario is false.
Former New Orleans Saints player Will Smith was shot and killed in New Orleans following a road rage altercation in April. Days later police discovered a loaded handgun in the car Smith was driving when the altercation occurred.
AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of “Bullets with AWR Hawkins,” a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.