BUFFALO, N.Y. — A white manager at the Buffalo massacre supermarket claims the accused teen gunman called her a “n—-r lover” during one of his reconnaissance trips to plan the attack that left 10 black people dead.
Rose Wysocki, 56, who works as a produce manager at Tops Friendly Market, told The Post that 18-year-old Payton Gendron made the alarming remark when he asked her for an item while she was working last month.
“I showed him where it was and he was acting stupid … I took him to the item and gave it to him. As I did, he remarked, ‘You look like you don’t belong here,'” Wysocki said of the encounter, which took place around Easter.
“I said, ‘What do you mean by that?’ He said, ‘You look like you just belong in a suburb store, not here.’ I said, ‘Well, I was in a suburb store and I got promoted here and I love it here. I love my customers, co-workers, the store. It’s a great place to work.’”
“As he turned and walked away, he said, ‘Another n—r lover,'” she added.
Wysocki claims she saw Gendron at the store several times after he made the initial remarks — but she avoided him every time.
She said her co-workers had also seen him there prior to Saturday’s alleged racially motivated mass shooting.
“He was in there scoping us out. He was planning his attack on us, on our community,” Wysocki alleged.
It wasn’t immediately clear how many times Gendron, who lives a three-hour drive away in Conklin, NY, visited the store as he was planning the alleged attack.
During one visit to Tops on March 8, the accused gunman claimed to be “collecting consensus data” after he was confronted by a security guard, according to a 500-page document posted online under Gendron’s name last month.
Gendron allegedly made detailed notes during that visit — including sketches of the supermarket’s layout, how many black shoppers were inside the store and the security guard’s movements.
Cops have already confirmed Gendron paid a “reconnaissance” visit to Tops on Friday — the day before he allegedly slaughtered his 10 victims.
Wysocki told The Post she hid in a conference room at the back of the store with several others when the gunfire rang out.
“I hear pop, pop, pop … People ran into the back and they were screaming,” Wysocki recalled, adding that a fellow manager tried to barricade the door with a table.
“We are sitting on the floor and I could just hear him coming closer and closer and closer to where we were. I was just praying, ‘Don’t let him come in here.’
“I remember this customer. I can still see what she was wearing … I’ll never forget her face. She had such fear in her eyes and she wouldn’t take her eyes off of me. I stared back at her and tried to tell her with my eyes it was going to be OK, it was going to be OK.”
