U.S. President Joe Biden condemned the killing of four Muslims in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in what authorities are describing as targeted attacks.
In a Twitter post after news of the fourth death, Biden said he was angered and saddened by the killings.
"While we await a full investigation, my prayers are with the victims’ families, and my administration stands strongly with the Muslim community," Biden said in a Twitter post. "These hateful attacks have no place in America."
Police in New Mexico and federal agencies were probing the killings, the latest of which occurred on Friday evening.
The other three Muslim men killed in the state's largest city in the past nine months appeared to have been targeted for their religion and race, police have said.
Two of those murdered men were members of the same mosque, who were shot dead in Albuquerque in late July and early August. Police said there was a "strong possibility" that their deaths were connected to the November killing of an Afghan immigrant.
New Mexico State Police, the FBI and the U.S. Marshals Service are among the agencies helping in the investigation.
New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham said in a Twitter post late on Saturday, "The targeted killings of Muslim residents of Albuquerque is deeply angering and wholly intolerable."
The Albuquerque police department said in a statement they had discovered the latest victim overnight Friday.
"Investigators believe Friday's murder may be connected to three recent murders of Muslim men also from South Asia," the statement said.
Two of the previous victims were Pakistani Muslim men, a 27-year-old whose body was found on Aug. 1 and a 41-year-old who was found on July 26.
New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham expressed outrage at the killings, calling them "wholly intolerable," and said she was sending additional state police officers to Albuquerque to aid in the investigation.
She said she was sending additional state police officers to Albuquerque to help with the investigation.
"We will continue to do everything we can to support to the Muslim community of Albuquerque and greater New Mexico," she said.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the largest U.S. Muslim civil rights group, has offered a $10,000 reward to whoever provides information leading to the killer or killers' arrest.
Tensions have risen sharply in the city's Muslim community.
"Now, people are beginning to panic," Tahir Gauba, the director of public affairs with the Islamic Center of New Mexico, told the Albuquerque Journal.
