Advocates and lawmakers from the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) community gathered at the Georgia State Capitol on Thursday to mark the two-year anniversary of the Atlanta spa shootings, which claimed the lives of eight people.
The anniversary served as a backdrop for a proposed bill calling for more restrictions on how people store guns around children.
The attacks hit hard for many, especially for those who lost loved ones, as six of the victims were of Asian descent, including Korean-Americans and Chinese-Americans.
Robert Aaron Long, who admitted to being the shooter, was sentenced to life without parole in his Cherokee County case, but has pleaded not guilty in Fulton County, where district attorney Fannie Willis has said she intends to seek the death penalty.
The somber occasion was marked with flowers laid at the site of one of the shootings to remember and honor the lives lost.
