By Kanishka Singh
WASHINGTON, July 17 (Reuters) – Prosecutors in a Utah county announced the filing of two attempted aggravated murder charges on Friday against a man who police said had stabbed a Muslim man multiple times earlier this week because of the victim’s religion.
Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill said the defendant, Peter Michael Larsen, was charged with two counts of first-degree felony attempted aggravated murder over Monday’s knife attack at the Valley Fair Mall in West Valley City.
“In the filed information document, notices are given for a potential hate crime, the defendant as a habitual violent offender, and use of a dangerous weapon by a restricted person,” Gill’s office said in a statement.
“An alleged unprovoked attack on anyone in our community is unacceptable, but an attack allegedly motivated because of the victim’s religion is alarming,” Gill added.
The victim had “multiple stab wounds all over his body and was bleeding profusely,” police said earlier this week. A friend said he was stabbed 15 times and needed surgeries.
Police had said the defendant told them he “intends to kill Muslims,” that “he had targeted the victim with intent to kill him because of his religion,” and that he constituted “a substantial danger to the public if released based on his violent actions … ideologies and pre-planned mass casualty events.”
DEFENDANT PINNED TO THE GROUND BY BYSTANDERS
A charging document filed on Friday said Larsen stated he wanted “to be a catalyst so people would rid the country of Muslims.”
The document cited Larsen as saying that “if he could go from one Muslim to another in close proximity, he would have killed as many as possible.”
Larsen also stated he chose that location because he knew there were Muslims there, according to the charging document.
Authorities said the defendant was pinned to the ground by bystanders before officers arrived on the scene. He was booked into the Salt Lake County jail.
U.S. rights advocates have said Islamophobia has risen in recent decades following the September 11, 2001, attacks, and more recently because of anti-immigration policies, white supremacy and the fallout of Israel’s war in Gaza.
Deadly violent attacks in recent years include a 2023 stabbing of a 6-year-old Muslim child in Illinois whose killer was sentenced to 53 years in prison and died in custody, and a 2026 shooting at a San Diego mosque that left five dead, including two teenage suspects.
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)
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