Suspected Gunman Charged

Prosecutors in Los Angeles on Thursday charged white supremacist Buford Furrow Jr. with killing a Filipino-American postman and shooting five other people -- three young boys and two women -- at a Jewish center earlier this week and said he has already confessed to committing the murder out of racial hatred. Furrow, a 39-year-old member of the racist Aryan Nations group, appeared briefly in state court and was denied bail. He smirked at reporters behind him in the court and, in a loud whisper, told his lawyer, "They all like me." The Los Angeles Times reports that Furrow said he scouted three other places in L.A. "to shoot Jews" (one was the Simon Wiesenthal Center) that morning but found the security at these sites too strict to penetrate.

• The taxi driver who drove Furrow from Los Angeles to Las Vegas after the shootings said he feels lucky to be alive. Hovik Garibyan, the Armenian-born cab driver who charged Furrow $800 for the four-hour ride, said he felt fortunate to have survived the trip after learning Furrow's identity. "I just think now that I'm lucky he don't kill me, too," Garibyan said at a news conference.
  
  
• Garibyan added that Furrow approached him in Hollywood and asked for a ride to the airport but changed his mind en route. "He told me, 'You know what? Can you drive me to Las Vegas?' Because he don't like to fly in an airplane," Garibyan said. "I said, 'Can you pay me up front?'"
  
  
• Garibyan said Furrow slept for most of the ride to Nevada, and they stopped only to buy an iced tea at a restaurant about 70 miles from Vegas. He said the white supremacist asked to be dropped off at the New York New York Hotel and Casino on the Strip. The cab driver said he didn't realize who his fare was until his boss woke him up with a phone call and asked him if he recognized the man whose picture was being shown on TV.