Man who shouted 'get out my country' before shooting two Indian immigrants in Kansas bar admits murder

Navy veteran asked if their 'status was legal' before opening fire

r Purinton admitted one count of premeditated first-degree murder in Mr Kuchibhotla's death (Henry County Sheriff's Office/AP)

A man who shouted "get out of my country" before he gunned down an Indian tech worker and injured two others, has pleaded guilty to first degree murder.

Adam Purinton faces a life in prison with no chance of parole for 50 years, after he admitted to shooting Srinivas Kuchibhotla and Alok Madasani last February. Kuchibhotla later died from his injuries in hospital.

The Indian nationals who were working as engineers at the Garmin tech company, had been drinking in Austin's Bar and Grill in the city of Olathe, Kansas, when the 52-year-old approached them.

Mr Madasani told detectives the assailant asked the men if their "status was legal" before opening fire with a handgun, according to an arrest affidavit released after the shooting last February.

Witnesses said the 52-year-old shouted "Get out of my country" as he shot the pair.

After Ian Grillot attempted to intervene, Purinton turned the gun on him blasting him in the hand and chest,

Documents released by Johnson County District Court revealed that he had been asked to leave the bar when he made derogatory comments but returned a short time later with the gun.

After the attack Purinton drove 70 miles to a restaurant in Missouri and told a bartender he had just shot two Iranian people.

He pleaded guilty to premeditated first-degree murder and two counts of attempted premeditated first-degree murder. He will be sentenced on 4 May and .

The Navy veteran still faces a federal case over the incident, including hate crime charges, that could carry a potential death sentence.

Kuchibhotla's widow, who was not present at the court hearing, released a statement saying she hoped the guilty plea would "send a strong message that hate is never acceptable."

Sunayana Dumala said: "We must understand and love one another”.

She also called on Donald Trump’s administration to fight hate crime in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, adding that her husband's murder had confirmed her worst fears about xenophobia and anti-immigrant sentiment in America.

In a separate interview with the KCTV-TV news channel, she said: "I told him many times: 'Should we think about going back? Should we think about going to a different country?' He said, 'No'."

Former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton tweeted a link to an article about the shooting at the time and called on Mr Trump to "step up and speak out" against "threats and hate crimes."

This was followed by a White House spokesperson condemning the shooting and telling reporters the incident appears to be "an act of racially motivated hatred."

The shooting is just one of a spate of killings which have recently raised the spectre of far-right violence in the US.