OAK CREEK, Wisconsin (CNN) - The man suspected of shooting and killing six people at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin on Sunday is former Army soldier Wade Michael Page, 40, law enforcement officials say. Authorities said Page was later shot and killed in a gun battle with police officers.
The FBI had is determining a motive and investigators were looking into whether the attack might be classified as domestic terrorism.
Tom Ahern, a spokesman for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, would not elaborate on the gunman's motives. He also would not elaborate on the man's tattoos.
Kanwardeep Singh Kaleka, a member of the five-year-old temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin, said those inside the gurdwara -- or Sikh house of worship -- described the attacker as a bald, white man, dressed in a white T-shirt and black pants and with a 9/11 tattoo on one arm -- which "implies to me that there's some level of hate crime there."
Because of their customary beards and turbans, Sikh men are often confused for Muslims, and have been the targets of hate crimes since the September 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington.
As officials investigate what allegedly made Page to go on his shooting spree shortly before the main Sunday morning service, America's Sikh community struggled to come to grips Monday with the brutal attack.
"It's probably somebody not in their right mind," Justice Singh Khalsa, a temple member since the 1990s, said late Sunday. "It's possibly a hate crime, somebody not understanding the religion."
The victims ranged in age from their late 20s to about 70, said Khalsa, who helped translate witness accounts for authorities.
One of the dead was a priest named Prakash Singh, who recently immigrated to the United States with his wife and two young children, Khalsa said.
The shooting also claimed the life of congregation president Satwant Kaleka, according to his son.
