Eight killed, including six women of Asian descent, at shootings at Atlanta day spas

Crime scene tape is seen outside Aromatherapy Spa after shootings at a massage parlor and two day spas in the Atlanta area, in Georgia, U.S. March 16, 2021. REUTERS/Chris Aluka Berry

(Reuters) - Eight people, six of them women of Asian descent, were shot dead in a string of attacks at day spas in and around Atlanta, and a man suspected of carrying out the shootings was arrested in southern Georgia, police said.

Although authorities declined to offer a motive for the violence, the attacks prompted the New York Police Department's counter-terrorism unit to announce the deployment of additional patrols in Asian communities there as a precaution.