A Facebook page appearing to belong to a Georgia sheriff’s office spokesman promoted a T-shirt with racist language about China and the coronavirus last year.
The Facebook account features numerous photos of Cherokee County sheriff’s Capt. Jay Baker going back months. Baker's office is helping to investigate the recent massage parlor slayings that occurred in the Atlanta area.
Four of the eight people killed in Tuesday's shootings were in Cherokee County. The shootings come amid a rise in hate crimes against Asian-Americans.
The March 2020 Facebook post about the T-shirt said, “Place your order while they last." The account was deleted Wednesday night.
The discovery of the Facebook post comes amid concerns from some Asian Americans that authorities are not treating the killings as hate crimes.
At a news conference Wednesday, Baker said that Robert Aaron Long, who has been charged with eight counts of murder, "was pretty much fed up and kind of at the end of his rope" and that Tuesday "was a really bad day for him, and this is what he did."
The comments were criticized as inappropriate and insensitive to the victims.
Baker didn't respond to requests for comment.
