This booking photo provided by the Crisp County Sheriff’s Office shows Robert Aaron Long on Tuesday March 16, 2021. Long was arrested as a suspect in the fatal shootings of several people in three massage parlors in the Atlanta area, most of whom were women of Asian descent the authorities said.
Crisp County Sheriff’s Office | AP
A Georgia man pleaded guilty Tuesday to four murders related to the shootings at three metro spas in Atlanta last March.
Robert Aaron Long is alleged to have killed eight people, six of whom are of Asian descent, in the Cherokee County and Atlanta shootings.
Long appealed to the Cherokee County Attorney’s Office on 23 charges related to the shooting. His legal team was negotiating a life sentence with no parole.
The 22-year-old is accused of killing Paul Andre Michels, Xiaojie Tan, Daoyou Feng and Delaina Ashley Yaun-Gonzalez at a spa in Cherokee County. Another man, Elcias Rocendo Hernandez Ortiz, was seriously injured when he was shot in the face.
Long could still be executed if convicted of the murder of four others in two spas in Atlanta. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis filed a motion with the Fulton County Supreme Court on Monday to move Long to a Fulton prison before being charged on four other homicide cases and several other charges. These include domestic terrorism, aggravated assault, and gun possession while committing a crime.
Willis said she plans to pursue the death penalty and hate crime charges for Long. She plans to act quickly once Long’s Cherokee County hearing is over, according to NBC News.
“Now that Mr. Long finishes his Cherokee County hearing, I want to make sure the Fulton County trial moves as quickly as possible,” Willis said, according to NBC News. “The victims of the crimes Mr. Long is charged with in Fulton County deserve no less.”
The shootings occurred on March 16. Police said Long at Young’s Asian Massage in Cherokee County shot and killed four people shortly before 5 p.m., three of them women and two Asian investigators.
Long then drove south to Atlanta, where he shot and killed three women at the Gold Spa before crossing the street to the Aromatherapy Spa and shooting another woman, according to police.
In initial interviews with investigators, Long claimed to have a “sex addiction”. Authorities said he allegedly took action against the spa companies he viewed as sexual temptation.
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