GREENWOOD, Ind. – Greenwood police have given an update on data found on the phone of a man who killed three people in a shooting inside Greenwood Park Mall nearly one year ago. Although there was nothing relating to the shooter’s plan to carry out the attack, investigators did discover Nazi-related material, videos of mass killings, and suicidal ruminations.
Jonathan Sapirman entered the Greenwood Park Mall food court on July 17, 2022, shooting and killing three people — Victor Gomez, 30, Pedro Pineda, 56, and his wife, Rosa Mirian Rivera de Pineda, 37 — before he was killed by 22-year-old armed bystander Elisjsha Dicken.
Greenwood Police Chief Jim Ison said in a press conference last December that the FBI was working to unlock the shooter’s phone, which they accomplished in May. In that December press conference, Chief Ison said the shooter’s motive was unclear but that he had a fascination with Nazi Germany.
There were 206 videos and 3458 images recovered, along with texts, internet searches, and notes, according to law enforcement. On the phone, there were many pictures of Adolf Hitler, Nazi propaganda, and firearms. Additionally, there were graphic videos of mass killings, including security camera footage of a mass shooting that happened at a mall in Burlington, Washington, in 2016.
Notable to authorities was an image of a handwritten note dated April 9, 2020, which appeared to law enforcement to be a suicide note. It begins with, “My final thoughts on paper.” In it, the shooter wrote, “I’m a sociopath. I want to hurt people.” He alluded to shooting himself with a shotgun, writing, “This was a result of my issues: mental instability, depression, frustration, and sexual isolation.”
A June 18, 2022 note written by Sapirman appeared to investigators to be a draft of a text that the shooter was going to send his brother where he expressed frustration about having his phone turned off, penning, “I’m going to shoot myself.” On the same day, Sapirman conducted an internet search titled, “How to go through with committing suicide.”
Jonathan Sapirman-Courtesy of the City of Greenwood
