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Tag: hate crimes

  • Suspect in custody after shootings of 2 Jewish men in LA

    Suspect in custody after shootings of 2 Jewish men in LA

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    LOS ANGELES — A person was taken into custody Thursday in connection with the shootings of two Jewish men outside synagogues in Los Angeles this week, police said.

    The violence set off fear among the city’s Jewish community as police increased patrols around houses of worship and officials decried the attacks.

    The two separate shootings occurred after the men left synagogues in the city’s Pico-Robertson neighborhood, according to the Anti-Defamation League’s Southern California branch. Both men survived.

    “This is a relief,” the branch wrote on Twitter after the arrest was announced. “Tonight, we can rest easy. Tomorrow, we will continue to fight against antisemitism.”

    Additional details about the person’s arrest were not immediately available. Los Angeles Police Officer Rosario Cervantes on Thursday said she could not confirm whether the suspect had targeted the Jewish men as part of a hate crime.

    The shootings happened in the morning on Wednesday and Thursday. Detectives said they were likely perpetrated by the same man, though it was not immediately clear whether he was the person who was taken into custody on Thursday.

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  • Native dancers want Arizona gallery owner held on hate crime

    Native dancers want Arizona gallery owner held on hate crime

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    PHOENIX — Native American dancers who were the target of a suburban Phoenix gallery owner’s racist rant as they were being filmed for Super Bowl week are pushing for hate crime charges.

    Gilbert Ortega Jr., the owner of Gilbert Ortega Native American Galleries, has been charged with three misdemeanor counts of disorderly conduct regarding the incident, Scottsdale police said.

    Cody Blackbird, a dancer and flutist who filmed the man’s tirade, said his group doesn’t feel safe, and that the confrontation has ruined what should have been a celebratory week.

    “Us performers are now going in different entrances and parking in different places. This man is known,” Blackbird said. “There’s a 10-year-old girl who was there. She’s forever imprinted with ‘This is what happened when the Super Bowl came to town.’”

    The group is seeking the involvement of the FBI, U.S. Justice Department and Arizona Attorney General’s Office.

    The confrontation happened Tuesday afternoon in Old Town Scottsdale, which has been seeing a high volume of visitors in town for the big game and the Phoenix Open. Ten dancers were performing in front of the Native Art Market on Main Street. ESPN was filming the group in the store and then had them pose outside by a Super Bowl sign.

    That’s when Ortega started yelling at them, Blackbird said. In the video, Ortega can be seen mocking them and yelling “you (expletive) Indians” at one point.

    His shop was closed Friday, and a listed number appears to not be in service. There was no immediate response to messages from The Associated Press left at multiple phone numbers and personal email addresses listed for him seeking comment.

    In Arizona, there is no law specific to a hate crime itself. It can be used as an aggravating circumstance in the commission of a crime where the motive was bias against a victim’s race, religion, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation or disability.

    Disorderly conduct does not qualify for a hate crime designation under the FBI’s definition, according to Scottsdale authorities. The FBI website describes a hate crime as “often a violent crime, such as assault, murder, arson, vandalism, or threats to commit such crimes.”

    Blackbird, who is of Eastern Band Cherokee and Dakota descent, said some Navajo performers heard Ortega make threats in their language that had violent and sexual innuendos. He also alleges Ortega charged at them and had to be physically restrained. He said he doesn’t see why it’s not being treated as a hate crime.

    “That’s what it’s seeming like, which really creates some horrible precedents, dangerous precedents,” said Blackbird, who has retained an attorney.

    Meanwhile, the video has gained traction on social media and brought unwanted attention to Scottsdale. Mayor David Ortega, who is not related to the gallery owner, called his behavior “reprehensible and inexcusable.”

    “The behavior exhibited by this individual saddens and disgusts the people of our community,” David Ortega said in a statement.

    The business is associated with a larger group of stores known for selling Native American items in the Southwest. But Ortega’s on the Plaza, located in New Mexico, said Gilbert Ortega Jr. is a distant relative and the Santa Fe store is not affiliated with him.

    “The family and employees of Ortega’s on the Plaza in Santa Fe condemn racism and discrimination in all forms,” Janelle Ortega said in a statement Thursday. “Furthermore, we consider it a great honor to carry and showcase the work of Indigenous artists and a privilege to support them in other important public and personal endeavors.”

    Blackbird said there are growing calls on social media for artists to boycott Gilbert Ortega Jr.’s business. He said racism exists even among people whose business hinges on Indigenous people.

    “That’s always been a thing in the Indian trader world,” Blackbird said. “They don’t care about the people that are making the items they’re selling and redesigning.”

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  • Man who allegedly fired replica gun inside San Francisco synagogue faces hate crime enhancement over public comments | CNN

    Man who allegedly fired replica gun inside San Francisco synagogue faces hate crime enhancement over public comments | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    A man arrested after allegedly firing a replica gun several times in a San Francisco synagogue now faces a hate crime enhancement, the city’s district attorney said Wednesday.

    The hate crime allegation against 51-year-old Dmitri Mishin is tied to statements he made during the incident as well as social media posts he made involving “several postings of an individual in Nazi-type clothing,” San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins said in a news conference.

    While officials did not share what Mishin said while inside the synagogue, prosecutors believe he “harbored antisemitic views and that was the motivation for his actions,” Jenkins said. The hate crime allegation will enhance punishment guidelines if he is convicted, she added.

    Mishin was arrested Friday, days after he allegedly stepped inside a synagogue in the Richmond District during a gathering and “made a verbal statement,” pulled out what appeared to be a firearm and shot several times inside the building, police have said.

    Police recovered expended shell casings at the scene and at the time said they believed he had been firing blanks.

    Mishin was charged Wednesday morning with two felony counts of “making threats obstructing exercise of religion,” and six misdemeanor counts of disturbing a religious meeting and brandishing a replica firearm, the district attorney’s office announced.

    He faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted of all charges, according to Jenkins. CNN has been unable to identify an attorney for Mishin.

    “It is clear that antisemitism is still active and strong even here in San Francisco, in such a diverse place, and it’s something that will not be tolerated by this office or by myself,” Jenkins said.

    Mishin was originally scheduled to be arraigned Wednesday but will now be arraigned Thursday, Jenkins said. Her office will request he be detained without bail, she added.

    “Anyone who would walk into a synagogue of that sort, and make the statements that he did and displayed what appeared to be a firearm, is somebody who poses a public safety risk,” Jenkins said.

    The incident at the San Francisco synagogue came just days after a man allegedly threw a Molotov cocktail at a New Jersey synagogue amid a backdrop of recent incendiary antisemitic incidents, including tweets from Kanye West, signs over a major Los Angeles bridge and messages projected on buildings in Florida.

    The Anti-Defamation League Center on Extremism, which has tracked incidents of US antisemitic harassment, vandalism and assault since 1979, found 2,717 incidents of antisemitism in the US in 2021, up a significant 34% from the previous year.

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  • ‘Invasion’ language continues after El Paso Walmart shooting

    ‘Invasion’ language continues after El Paso Walmart shooting

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    EL PASO, Texas — From inside a Texas Walmart in 2019 during one of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history, Adria Gonzalez heard the gunman shout epithets against Mexicans as she helped panicked shoppers toward the store exits.

    She won’t be there Wednesday when Patrick Crusius is expected to plead guilty in an El Paso courtroom to federal hate crime and firearms charges for the killing of 23 people. But she is angry federal prosecutors won’t seek the death penalty over a racist attack that, according to investigators, was preceded by the shooter posting an online screed that warned of a “Hispanic invasion” of Texas.

    “It’s a slap in the face for us Latinos,” Gonzalez said.

    The expected guilty plea would amount to the first conviction in a case that has dragged on more than three years, and Crusius could still face the death penalty over separate state charges. But for Democrats and immigrant rights groups, there is a separate disappointment: How the description of an “invasion” on the U.S.-Mexico border has continued in American politics even after the El Paso shooting.

    From campaign stumps to hearings in Congress, Republicans have increasingly described high numbers of migrant crossings into the U.S. as an invasion threatening public safety and overwhelming border communities. Critics have condemned the characterization as anti-immigrant and dangerous in the aftermath of El Paso and other racially motivated attacks.

    The issue flared again Tuesday during a hearing on border security in the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, where Democrats accused the other side of fanning rhetoric against migrants. Republicans pushed back.

    “For my colleagues on the other side of the aisle who want to state that we’re using this hearing for white nationalism, I’m not doing that,” said Republican Rep. Byron Donalds of Florida, who is Black.

    The Aug. 3, 2019, shooting happened on a busy weekend at a Walmart that is typically popular with shoppers from Mexico and the U.S. In addition to those killed, more than two dozen were injured and hundreds more were scarred by being present or having a loved-one hurt.

    Many of the dead and wounded were citizens of Mexico.

    Crusius, 24, surrendered to police after the massacre, saying, “I’m the shooter,” and that he was targeting Mexicans, according to court records. Prosecutors have said he drove more than 10 hours from his hometown near Dallas to the largely-Latino border city. Crusius published a document online shortly before opening fire that said his shooting was in response to what he called “the Hispanic invasion of Texas.”

    Republican Gov. Greg Abbott was criticized for a fundraising mailer dated the day before the attack calling on his supporters to “defend Texas” from immigrants entering the country illegally. He responded at the time by saying “mistakes were made” over the mailer, though did not elaborate or assign fault.

    But Abbott has more recently embraced using the word “invasion” while authorizing a series of hardline immigration measures, including a letter to state police and the Texas National Guard in November with the subject line “Defend Texas Against Invasion.”

    Abbott has defended his statements by saying he is invoking language included in the U.S. Constitution. Some legal scholars have called it a misreading of the clause.

    “If this is not an invasion, what is it?” Abbott told CNN’s Jake Tapper during an interview last month. “Think about the volume of people coming across the border.”

    Abbott’s office did not return a request seeking comment Tuesday.

    Texas state Sen. Roland Gutierrez, a Democrat whose district includes South Texas, said the language needs to stop. “We are not at war here,” he said.

    America’s Voice, an immigration reform group, said it tracked more than 80 Republican candidates during last year’s midterm elections who amplified what they called “invasion” and “replacement” conspiracies.

    “I think it’s been creeping over the years,” said Zachary Mueller, political director of America’s Voice. “What I would say is that in 2021, there was a marked shift where it went from the fringes of the Republican Party into the mainstream of the Republican Party.”

    A database of mass killings in the U.S. since 2006 compiled by The Associated Press, USA Today and Northeastern University shows that the number of deadly mass shootings linked to hate crimes has increased in recent years. Among 13 prominent instances, the 2019 Walmart shooting was the deadliest. The database tracks every mass killing — defined as four dead, not including the offender — in the U.S. since 2006.

    It remains unclear when Crusius might still face trial on separate state charges in Texas. Gonzalez, who has been credited with saving lives in the Walmart, believes the death penalty would send a message.

    Tending to her 3-month-old infant at home in El Paso, Gonzalez says she lives in fear of further attacks and now carries a small handgun with her for protection after completing firearms training.

    “This stays with us, the ones that were inside that Walmart shooting that August morning,” she said. “We’re the ones that saw everything, and we’re still hurting inside.”

    ___

    Weber reported from Austin, Texas. Associated Press reporters Acacia Coronado and Jake Bleiberg in Dallas contributed to this report.

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  • New York City man pleads guilty to hate crime in death of Asian man, district attorney says | CNN

    New York City man pleads guilty to hate crime in death of Asian man, district attorney says | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    More than a year after an Asian man died after being assaulted in New York City, Jarrod Powell pleaded guilty in his death and will serve 22 years in prison, the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office announced Thursday.

    Powell, 51, pleaded guilty to one count of manslaughter in the first degree as a hate crime as part of a plea deal, the district attorney’s office said.

    In April 2021, Yao Pan Ma was collecting cans when he was approached from behind on an East Harlem corner, struck in the back and, after he fell to the ground, kicked in the head multiple times, according to police.

    Ma, who was Chinese-American, was unresponsive and in a state of unconsciousness since being admitted to a hospital to be treated for his head injuries. He died from his injuries eight months after the attack, on December 31, 2021.

    “This unprovoked attack took the life of Yao Pan Ma and took away a sense of security for so many in the AAPI community in New York,” District Attorney Alvin Bragg said after the plea. “Jarrod Powell attacked Mr. Ma because of his race and is now being held accountable. My thoughts are with Mr. Ma’s family and friends as they continue to mourn this loss.”

    Powell’s attorney, Liam Malanaphy, declined CNN’s request for comment.

    Powell “admitted in his plea to this hate crime” that he targeted Ma because he was Asian, according to the district attorney’s office.

    The attack came amid a surge in hate crimes against Asian Americans that prompted the New York Police Department to deploy undercover Asian officers on the streets in an attempt to stem the violence.

    Reported hate crimes against Asians in 16 of the nation’s largest cities and counties rose 164% in 2021, according to a study from the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at Cal State University San Bernardino.

    The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office says it has 44 open cases related to anti-Asian hate crimes as of January 2023.

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  • Christian graves desecrated in historic Jerusalem cemetery

    Christian graves desecrated in historic Jerusalem cemetery

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    JERUSALEM — More than 30 graves at a historic Christian cemetery in Jerusalem were found toppled and vandalized, the diocese said Wednesday, jolting the Christian minority in the contested city.

    Israel’s Foreign Ministry called the attack an “immoral act” and “an affront to religion.” Jerusalem’s Anglican Archbishop Hosam Naoum called it a “clear hate crime.” The British consulate said it was just the latest in a string of assaults on the Christian community in the holy city of Jerusalem.

    Police officers were sent to the Protestant Cemetery on Jerusalem’s Mount Zion to investigate the profanation. Mount Zion, associated in Christian tradition with the site of the Last Supper that Jesus shared with his disciples the night before his crucifixion, is also sacred to Jews and Muslims and has been at the center of competing religious claims throughout the decadeslong Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

    Widely shared security camera footage on Sunday showed two young men — both wearing a Jewish skullcap and tzitzit, the knotted ritual fringes worn by observant Jews — breaking into the cemetery, knocking over stone crosses and smashing and stomping on tombstones, leaving a trail of debris and broken headstones.

    Among the destroyed tombs was one containing a 19th century bust of Samuel Gobat, the second Protestant Bishop in Jerusalem who died in 1879, the Episcopal diocese said. The graves of three police officers, British citizens serving in the police force of what was then British-ruled Palestine, were also vandalized.

    The diocese cautioned that the desecration of the cemetery should be seen as an ominous warning about “hatred against Christians.”

    “Many stone crosses were the targets of the vandals, clearly indicating that these criminal acts were motivated by religious bigotry,” it said, urging authorities to redouble efforts to find the perpetrators.

    The Protestant Cemetery on the venerated Mount Zion just outside Jerusalem’s Old City walls was established in 1848 and was part of territory that Israel seized in the 1967 Mideast war. The cemetery houses the graves of dozens of Palestinian police officers killed during the First and Second World Wars as well as Christian leaders who died in the 19th and 20th centuries.

    Jewish extremists have defaced church property on Mount Zion in the past years. Jews consider Mount Zion the traditional burial place of the biblical King David and some ultra-Orthodox and nationalist activists have opposed Christian prayer rights at the site. A Jewish seminary known as the Diaspora Yeshiva has taken over many buildings in the Mount Zion compound.

    Some 16,000 Christians live in Jerusalem, the majority of whom are Palestinian. Israel claims Jerusalem as its eternal capital, while Palestinians want east Jerusalem as the capital for their hoped-for independent state.

    ___

    This story has been clarified to show the three police officers whose graves were also vandalized were British citizens in the police force of what was then British-ruled Palestine.

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  • Christian graves desecrated in historic Jerusalem cemetery

    Christian graves desecrated in historic Jerusalem cemetery

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    JERUSALEM — More than 30 graves at a historic Christian cemetery in Jerusalem were found toppled and vandalized, the diocese said Wednesday, jolting the Christian minority in the contested city.

    Israel’s Foreign Ministry called the attack an “immoral act” and “an affront to religion.” Jerusalem’s Anglican Archbishop Hosam Naoum called it a “clear hate crime.” The British consulate said it was just the latest in a string of assaults on the Christian community in the holy city of Jerusalem.

    Police officers were sent to the Protestant Cemetery on Jerusalem’s Mount Zion to investigate the profanation. Mount Zion, associated in Christian tradition with the site of the Last Supper that Jesus shared with his disciples the night before his crucifixion, is also sacred to Jews and Muslims and has been at the center of competing religious claims throughout the decadeslong Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

    Widely shared security camera footage on Sunday showed two young men — both wearing a Jewish skullcap and tzitzit, the knotted ritual fringes worn by observant Jews — breaking into the cemetery, knocking over stone crosses and smashing and stomping on tombstones, leaving a trail of debris and broken headstones.

    Among the destroyed tombs was one containing a 19th century bust of Samuel Gobat, the second Protestant Bishop in Jerusalem who died in 1879, the Episcopal diocese said. The graves of three police officers, British citizens serving in the police force of what was then British-ruled Palestine, were also vandalized.

    The diocese cautioned that the desecration of the cemetery should be seen as an ominous warning about “hatred against Christians.”

    “Many stone crosses were the targets of the vandals, clearly indicating that these criminal acts were motivated by religious bigotry,” it said, urging authorities to redouble efforts to find the perpetrators.

    The Protestant Cemetery on the venerated Mount Zion just outside Jerusalem’s Old City walls was established in 1848 and was part of territory that Israel seized in the 1967 Mideast war. The cemetery houses the graves of dozens of Palestinian police officers killed during the First and Second World Wars as well as Christian leaders who died in the 19th and 20th centuries.

    Jewish extremists have defaced church property on Mount Zion in the past years. Jews consider Mount Zion the traditional burial place of the biblical King David and some ultra-Orthodox and nationalist activists have opposed Christian prayer rights at the site. A Jewish seminary known as the Diaspora Yeshiva has taken over many buildings in the Mount Zion compound.

    Some 16,000 Christians live in Jerusalem, the majority of whom are Palestinian. Israel claims Jerusalem as its eternal capital, while Palestinians want east Jerusalem as the capital for their hoped-for independent state.

    ___

    This story has been clarified to show the three police officers whose graves were also vandalized were British citizens in the police force of what was then British-ruled Palestine.

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  • California police make hate-crime arrest in anti-Asian rant

    California police make hate-crime arrest in anti-Asian rant

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    SAN RAMON, Calif. — A Colorado man was arrested for investigation of committing hate crimes in California after two young adults of Asian descent were targeted with racist and homophobic comments as they recorded a TikTok food review video at an In-N-Out Burger restaurant, police said.

    The incident occurred Dec. 24 in the San Francisco Bay Area city of San Ramon, and the video’s spread online caught the attention of Police Chief Denton Carlson, who put word out on social media seeking the identities of the victims and the suspect.

    “During their meal, a male suspect approached the victims unprovoked and engaged in a homophobic and racist rant, causing the victims to fear for their safety,” the San Ramon Police Department said in a press release.

    Police detectives contacted the victims and began an investigation that led to the arrest of Jordan Douglas Krah, 40, of Denver, on Dec. 26, the department said. Krah was booked into jail on suspicion of two counts of committing a hate crime.

    Krah could not be reached for comment Wednesday. A call to a telephone listing under that name was answered by a recording saying the voice mailbox was full.

    The Contra Costa County District Attorney’s Office did not immediately respond to emails asking whether charges will be filed.

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  • TikTokers Harassed at In-N-Out Burger With Racist Slurs

    TikTokers Harassed at In-N-Out Burger With Racist Slurs

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    Two Asian-Amercian customers at an In-N-Out Burger in San Ramon, California, were filming a TikTok video when a man verbally abused them with homophobic and racist language. The video, posted on Christmas, has since gone viral and led police to arrest suspect Jordan Douglas Krah on hate crime charges.

    @arinekim My friend and i were filming his reaction to my in-n-out order when this happened… #arinekim ♬ original sound – arine kim

    In the video, Arine Kim and Elliot Ha are seated inside an In-N-Out Burger, filming Ha’s reaction to Kim’s “light-well fries.” Off camera, a man approaches and asks them if they’re filming themselves eating, then he calls them “weird homosexuals.”

    Kim and Ha are taken aback by the comment but continue their review when the man returns to ask about their ethnicity. When Ha tells him he’s Korean, the man says, “You’re Kim Jong Un’s boyfriend, huh?”

    Not quite sure how to react, Ha plays along as the man’s questioning about his sexual orientation starts to become more aggressive. Kim notices that the situation is escalating and tells Ha to stop engaging and not react. The conversation’s tenor suddenly changes — Ha apologizes, and the man off-camera begins to threaten him.

    “Normally, I could spit in your face,” he says. Then he makes a derogatory remark about Filipinos.

    The man returns a few minutes later, harassing them with more homophobic comments before threatening to meet Ha outside. Kim asks nervously, “Do you think he’s going to pull a gun on us?”

    Related: Woman Throws Computer Monitor at Gate Agent After Missing Flight in Chaotic Footage

    Police arrest

    Kim posted the disturbing video on Christmas day and immediately received an outpouring of support from TikTok users shocked by the abhorrent hate language used. Some Venmoed money saying the next meal was on them.

    Kim’s TikTok caught the attention of Chief Denton Carlson of the San Ramone police department, who contacted Kim via Twitter. The next day the police arrested a suspect identified as Jordan Douglas Krah of Denver, Colorado.

    Krah was later released, but in an update video on TikTok, Kim says she has pressed hate crime charges.

    The incident left many wondering what happened after Kim shut off the camera. So Kim made another video a few days later, explaining that Krah waited outside the restaurant for about 10 minutes, glaring at them through the window.

    “We just stayed in our seats and didn’t move because we were scared if we did move, he would use that as an invitation to harass us more,” she said.

    She also revealed that she’d been contacted via Instagram by a Filipino family, who claimed that Krah spit and hurled racist comments at them in nearby Danville.

    Kim said she and Ha didn’t initially go to the police because Krah didn’t physically harm them. “I honestly thought our experiences were going to be dismissed,” she explained. “We didn’t think anyone would care.”

    But the reaction on TikTok and from law enforcement has been overwhelmingly supportive. Kim said she was grateful to have the platform to shed light on hate crimes and “the atrocities that minorities have to go through on a daily basis.”

    According to a report published by Stop AAPI Hate, the Asian American community reported more than 10,000 hate incidents in 2020 and 2021, nearly half occurred in public places.

    “I hope my situation inspires others to talk about their own experiences,” Kim said.

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  • Hearing delayed for ex-DA charged in wake of Arbery killing

    Hearing delayed for ex-DA charged in wake of Arbery killing

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    BRUNSWICK, Ga. — A judge has postponed a court hearing this week for a former Georgia prosecutor charged with meddling in the police investigation of the 2020 killing of Ahmaud Arbery.

    Superior Court Judge John R. Turner ordered that the court appearance for former Brunswick Judicial Circuit District Attorney Jackie Johnson’, initially scheduled for Thursday, be held later, according to court records. The judge has not set a new date.

    Johnson has not appeared in court since she was indicted in September 2021 on charges of violating her oath of office and hindering police investigating Arbery’s killing. White men in pickup trucks chased the young Black man on Feb. 23, 2020, after spotting him running in their neighborhood outside coastal Brunswick. The chase ended with Arbery being shot dead in the street.

    The man who initiated the chase, Greg McMichael, was a retiree who had worked as an investigator for Johnson. She was still Glynn County’s top prosecutor when Arbery was killed, but lost her reelection campaign a few months later.

    The indictment against Johnson accuses her of using her office to try to shield Greg McMichael and Travis McMichael, his adult son who fired the fatal shotgun blasts, from prosecution.

    Both McMichaels and a neighbor who joined the chase and recorded cellphone video of the killing, William “Roddie” Bryan, weren’t arrested until more than two months later when the video leaked online and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation took over the case from local police.

    The McMichaels and Bryan all have since been convicted of murder and federal hate crime charges.

    Johnson has denied wrongdoing, saying she immediately recused herself from the investigation into Arbery’s death.

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  • Kurds, anti-racism groups gather after deadly Paris shooting

    Kurds, anti-racism groups gather after deadly Paris shooting

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    PARIS — Members of France‘s Kurdish community and anti-racism activists joined together in mourning and anger on Saturday in Paris after three people were killed at a Kurdish cultural center in an attack that prosecutors say was racially motivated.

    The shooting in a bustling neighborhood of central Paris also wounded three people, and stirred up concerns about hate crimes against minority groups at a time when far-right voices have gained prominence in France and around Europe in recent years.

    The suspected attacker was wounded and detained, and transferred Saturday to psychiatric care, the Paris prosecutor’s office said. The 69-year-old Parisian had been charged with attacking a migrant camp last year and released from jail earlier this month. For Friday’s shooting, he is facing potential charges of murder and attempted murder with a racist motive, the prosecutor’s office said.

    Thousands gathered Saturday at the Place de la Republique in eastern Paris, waving a colorful spectrum of flags representing Kurdish rights groups, left-wing political movements and other causes.

    The gathering was largely peaceful, though some youths threw projectiles and set a few cars and garbage bins on fire, and police fired tear gas to disperse the crowd. Some protesters shouted slogans against the Turkish government. Berivan Firat of the Kurdish Democratic Council in France told BFM TV that the violence began after some people drove by waving a Turkish flag.

    Most demonstrators were ethnic Kurds of varying generations who came together to mourn the three fellow Kurds who were killed, who included a prominent feminist activist and a Kurdish singer who came to France as a refugee.

    ”We are devastated, really. We are destroyed because we lost a very important member of our community and we are angry. How is this possible?” said demonstrator Yekbun Ogur, a middle school biology teacher in Paris. “Is it normal for a man with a gun to sneak into a cultural place to come and murder people?”

    Demonstrator Yunus Cicek wiped his tears away as spoke of the victims, and his fears. “We are not protected here. Even though I have political refugee status, I don’t feel safe. … Maybe next time it will be me.”

    The shooting shook the Kurdish community and put French police on extra alert for the Christmas weekend. The Paris police chief met Saturday with members of the Kurdish community to try to allay their fears.

    France’s Interior Ministry reported a 13% rise in race-related crimes or other violations in 2021 over 2019, after an 11% rise from 2018 to 2019. The ministry did not include 2020 in its statistics because of successive pandemic lockdowns that year. It said a disproportionate number of such crimes target people of African descent, and also cited hundreds of attacks based on religion.

    Friday’s attack took place at the cultural center and a nearby Kurdish restaurant and Kurdish hair salon. Surveillance video from the hair salon shared online suggests people in the salon subdued the attacker before police reached the scene. The prosecutor’s office would not elaborate on the circumstances of his arrest.

    Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said the suspect was clearly targeting foreigners, and had acted alone and was not officially affiliated with any extreme-right or other radical movements. The suspect had past convictions for illegal arms possession and armed violence.

    Kurdish activists said they had recently been warned by police of threats to Kurdish targets.

    In 2013, three women Kurdish activists, including Sakine Cansiz, a founder of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, were found shot dead at a Kurdish center in Paris.

    Turkey’s army has long been battling against Kurdish militants affiliated with the banned PKK in southeast Turkey as well as in northern Iraq. Turkey’s military also recently launched a series of air and artillery strikes against Syrian Kurdish militant targets in northern Syria.

    ———

    Boubkar Benzebat in Paris contributed.

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  • Nazi symbols carved into menorah in Beverly Hills; man held

    Nazi symbols carved into menorah in Beverly Hills; man held

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    BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. — A man was arrested after Nazi symbols were carved into a menorah in Beverly Hills, police said.

    Officers responded Sunday night to reports that a menorah on private property was being vandalized, police said in a statement.

    Use of surveillance video led to the arrest of Eric Brian King, of Dallas, Texas, for investigation of felony vandalism and a hate crime, police said.

    It was not immediately known if King had an attorney. Online Los Angeles County jail information showed that King, 47, was scheduled for a court appearance on Tuesday.

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  • Washington man gets 2 years for threatening Black shoppers

    Washington man gets 2 years for threatening Black shoppers

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    EVERETT, Wash. — A suburban Seattle man was sentenced Friday to two years in federal prison for threatening to shoot Black customers at grocery stores in Buffalo, New York, and at businesses in other states.

    Joey George of Lynnwood pleaded guilty in November to making interstate threats and the hate crime of interference with a federally protected activity, The Daily Herald reported.

    As part of a plea agreement George admitted he made phone calls threatening to shoot Black customers at grocery stores in Buffalo, restaurants in California and Connecticut, and a marijuana dispensary in Maryland.

    According to the plea agreement, George started making calls in July — telling staff at one store to “take him seriously” as he was “preparing to shoot all Black customers.” One store closed.

    In May, a man massacred 10 Black shoppers and employees and hurt several others at Tops Friendly Supermarket in Buffalo. A 19-year-old white man, Payton Gendron, has pleaded guilty to murder and hate-motivated terrorism charges, guaranteeing he will spend the rest of his life in prison.

    George did not call the same store but referenced it in threats, prosecutors said.

    His calls to businesses in other states also involved threats to Black people and in one case, Hispanic people, prosecutors said.

    “What he did in this case was deplorable,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas Woods said at sentencing Friday.

    George’s public defender, Mohammad Hamoudi, said his client has autism and suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder after a traumatic, abusive childhood that caused him to disassociate from reality.

    While at the Federal Detention Center in SeaTac, George has been seeing a psychologist, Hamoudi said.

    In court Friday, George said he regrets his actions.

    “What I did was wrong, and there is no excuse,” he said. “And I feel bad for the people that I scared.”

    U.S. District Court Judge Ricardo Martinez sentenced George to two years, the middle of the sentencing guidelines range. He called George’s actions “nothing other than terrorizing to the victims on the other end of those calls.”

    Martinez also said the case shows the need for more mental health care.

    “The fact that intellectually disabled people with severe mental health challenges end up in courtrooms and courthouses, rather than in places where they can be taken care of and perhaps helped, is one of the most difficult things in today’s society,” the judge said.

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  • Warnings on gay club shooter stir questions about old case

    Warnings on gay club shooter stir questions about old case

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    DENVER — A California woman who warned a judge last year about the danger posed by the suspect in the Colorado Springs gay nightclub shooting said Friday that the deaths could have been prevented if earlier charges against the suspect weren’t dismissed.

    Jeanie Streltzoff — a relative of alleged shooter Anderson Lee Aldrich — urged Colorado Judge Robin Chittum in a letter last November to incarcerate the suspect following a 2021 standoff with SWAT teams that uncovered a stockpile of more than 100 pounds (45 kilograms) of explosive material, firearms and ammunition.

    Aldrich should have been in prison at the time of the shooting and prevented from obtaining weapons, she told The Associated Press on Friday.

    “Five people died,” Streltzoff said, hushing the final word. “Someone should have done something.”

    Streltzoff blamed Aldrich’s grandmother and mother for dodging subpoenas that would have forced them to testify in the bomb threat case. But documents unsealed Thursday also raised questions about whether authorities were aggressive enough in their pursuit of a conviction or could have sought different charges when it became clear Aldrich’s mother, Laura Voepel, and grandparents Jonathan and Pamela Pullen wouldn’t testify.

    The case was derailed because prosecutors couldn’t properly serve subpoenas to the Pullens, who had moved to Florida, and Voepel, who was still in Colorado Springs, and ran out of time under fair trial rules, according to District Attorney Michael Allen and court documents.

    George Washington University Law Professor Jonathan Turley said he found the district attorney’s explanations of why he dropped the case “incomplete” and was surprised Allen didn’t amend the charges to involve the threat to the police and community.

    “This was a potential crime that didn’t just solely impact the grandparents,” Turley said. “This was a three hour standoff. This was disruptive. The police were threatened.”

    It’s rare for a criminal case to fall apart over a failure to deliver subpoenas to a couple victims or witnesses, Turley said. He also noted that police and prosecutors have enhanced abilities to access property and serve people in criminal cases.

    Aldrich, 22, who is nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns according to defense attorneys, was initially charged with kidnapping and other felonies in the 2021 case.

    Court documents describe how Aldrich told frightened grandparents about firearms and bomb-making material in their basement, talked of plans to become the “next mass killer,” and vowed not to let them interfere with plans to “go out in a blaze.” Aldrich livestreamed on Facebook a subsequent confrontation with SWAT teams at the house of mother Laura Voepel.

    Former deputy district attorney Mark Waller, who ran against Allen in the last election, said prosecutors should have amended charges to obstruction of justice, given that Aldrich was deemed so dangerous a SWAT team and bomb squad had to be deployed and surrounding homes evacuated.

    “They have that video of (Aldrich) saying he’s going to blow everything up. They could have easily charged … obstruction of justice,” said Waller. “It could have prevented this whole thing from happening.”

    A spokesperson for the district attorney’s office, Howard Black, said “numerous” attempts were made to serve subpoenas in the case but did not provide further details.

    About a week before the case was dismissed, a lawyer for Pamela Pullen asked the court to quash, or reject, a subpoena that had been left in her mailbox. It’s not clear when that subpoena had been left for her. Black said it was “just one attempt of many” to subpoena Pullen.

    He dismissed the idea prosecutors could have pursued charges for the harm caused to neighbors during the bomb scare, noting that evacuations happen a lot. Prosecutors filed charges based on the evidence they had and what they ethically believed they could prove in court, Black said.

    Pullen’s attorney in the bomb threat case, Aaron Gaddis, did not immediately respond to a phone message seeking comment. Phone calls to Pamela and Jonathan Pullen have not been returned.

    Jonathan Pullen is Streltzoff’s brother and Aldrich’s step-grandfather. Streltzoff said he is a “gentle soul” who had lived in fear of his grandchild for years.

    In the letter Streltzoff and her older brother, Robert Pullen, wrote to the court in November 2021, they detailed multiple instances of Aldrich menacing their brother, who they said “lived in a virtual prison.”

    Aldrich punched holes in the walls of the grandparents’ Colorado home and broke windows, and the grandparents “had to sleep in their bedroom with the door locked” and a bat by the bed, they wrote. They also said Pamela Pullen gave Aldrich $30,000, used to buy a 3D printer to make gun parts.

    Streltzoff said Aldrich was treated with “kid gloves” by their grandmother “no matter what” they did.

    During Aldrich’s teenage years in San Antonio, the letter said Aldrich attacked Jonathan Pullen and sent him to the emergency room with undisclosed injuries. Jonathan Pullen later lied to police out of fear of Aldrich, according to the letter, which also said the suspect could not get along with classmates as a youth so had been homeschooled.

    Streltzoff said Friday from the doorway of her Southern California home that the letter actually underplayed how menacing Aldrich was. She said they had “terrorized my younger brother for years.”

    She hasn’t seen Jonathan Pullen since 2010 and has lost touch with him since the bomb scare. He hasn’t returned her recent call and text messages and her other brother hasn’t spoken with him.

    “No one knows where they are now,” Streltzoff said.

    Aldrich tried to reclaim guns seized by authorities after the 2021 threat, but they were not returned, according to Allen. But soon after the charges were dropped, Aldrich boasted of having regained firearms and showed former roommate Xavier Kraus two rifles, body armor and incendiary rounds, Kraus told AP.

    Aldrich was formally charged Tuesday with 305 criminal counts, including hate crimes and murder, in the Nov. 19 shooting at Club Q, a sanctuary for the LGBTQ community in mostly conservative Colorado Springs.

    Investigators say Aldrich entered just before midnight with an AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle and began shooting during a drag queen’s birthday celebration. Patrons stopped the killing by wrestling the suspect to the ground and beating Aldrich into submission, witnesses said.

    ————

    Melley reported from Los Angeles and Condon from New York. Matthew Brown contributed from Billings, Mont.

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  • Buffalo grocery store mass shooter willing to plead guilty to federal charges if death penalty off the table, attorneys say | CNN

    Buffalo grocery store mass shooter willing to plead guilty to federal charges if death penalty off the table, attorneys say | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    The gunman who killed 10 people and wounded three in a racist attack at a grocery store in a predominantly Black neighborhood of Buffalo, New York, would be willing to plead guilty to federal charges – including hate crimes – if prosecutors agree to take the death penalty off the table, his attorneys said Friday.

    Attorneys representing Payton Gendron made their statements during a court hearing on Friday, seven months after Gendron used an illegally modified semiautomatic rifle to carry out the mass shooting.

    Gendron, a 19-year-old White man, had faced multiple federal hate crime charges, which carry the potential for the death penalty, in addition to several firearms charges. He had pleaded not guilty to the federal charges.

    He pleaded guilty in a state court last month to one count of a domestic act of terrorism motivated by hate, 10 counts of first-degree murder, three counts of attempted murder and a weapons possession charge in the mass shooting at Tops Friendly Markets on May 14. Those charges come with a mandatory sentence of life in prison without the chance of parole.

    “Just as Payton Gendron entered a plea of guilty to the indictment in county court, he is prepared to enter a plea of guilty in federal court in exchange of the same sentence, which is the sentence of life in prison, without parole,” said his defense attorney Sonya Zoghlin.

    Magistrate Judge Kenneth Schroeder in court on Friday balked at giving attorneys more time to review the voluminous evidence connected with the case since Gendron has already pleaded guilty to state charges.

    Gendron’s defense team said in court they plan to take the first steps to meet with the US Attorney in Buffalo and the Assistant Attorney General from Washington so that they can make a formal presentation to as to why Gendron should not get the death penalty.

    The first meetings are scheduled after the new year, attorneys said in court on Friday.

    “There’s a lot to go through and I think that mitigation presentation, obviously, is highly important for them, in addition to the facts of the case, so that’s why we consented this time,” said Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph Tripi.

    Judge Schroeder scheduled the next hearing for March 10, during which attorneys will give an update on how much of the evidence they’ve been able to review and if they can work out a deal with prosecutors.

    Meanwhile, Gendron will be sentenced on his state conviction on similar charges in February.

    The victims, including customers, employees and an armed security guard, ranged in age from 20 to 86. Eleven of the 13 people shot were Black and two were White, officials said.

    Social media posts and a lengthy document written by the gunman reveal he had been planning his attack for months and had visited the Tops supermarket several times previously. He posted that he chose Tops because it was in a particular ZIP code in Buffalo that had the highest percentage of Black people close enough to where he lived in Conklin, New York.

    The document outlined his goals for the attack, according to Flynn: “To kill as many African Americans as possible, avoid dying and spread ideals.”

    Gendron shot four people outside the grocery store and nine more inside before surrendering to Buffalo Police officers who responded to the scene, according to an indictment.

    New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said following the attack that the AR-15 style rifle used in the shooting was legally purchased in New York State, but was modified with a high-capacity magazine, which is not legal in the state.

    The earlier guilty plea ensured there will be no state trial and Gendron will not appeal, defense attorney Brian Parker said.

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  • FBI got tip about shooting suspect a day before 2021 arrest

    FBI got tip about shooting suspect a day before 2021 arrest

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    DENVER — Authorities said the person who would later kill five at a Colorado gay nightclub was on the FBI’s radar a day before being arrested for threatening to kill family members but agents closed out the case just weeks later.

    The disclosure by the FBI to The Associated Press creates a new timeline for when law enforcement was first alerted to Anderson Lee Aldrich as a potential danger. Previously it was thought Aldrich only became known to authorities after making the threat on June 18, 2021.

    Aldrich’s grandparents ran from their Colorado Springs home last year and called 911, saying Aldrich was building a bomb in the basement and had threatened to kill them. Details of the case remain sealed, but an arrest affidavit verified by the AP detailed how Aldrich, who is nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns, was upset the grandparents were moving to Florida because it would get in the way of Aldrich’s plans to conduct a mass shooting and bombing.

    As part of the FBI’s probe, the agency said it coordinated with the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office, which had responded to the June 18, 2021, call from Aldrich’s grandparents and arrested Aldrich on felony menacing and kidnapping charges. But the FBI closed its assessment of Aldrich about a month after getting the tip.

    “With state charges pending, the FBI closed its assessment on July 15, 2021,” the FBI said.

    Those charges were later dropped for unknown reasons. Under Colorado law, cases that are dismissed by either prosecutors or a judge are automatically sealed to prevent people from having their lives ruined if they do not end up being prosecuted. Authorities have cited the law in refusing to answer questions about the case but a coalition of media organizations, including the AP, has asked the court to unseal the records.

    A spokesperson for the sheriff’s office, Sgt. Jason Garrett, declined to comment on the FBI’s statement or on whether his agency had any tips about Aldrich before Aldrich’s 2021 arrest, citing the sealing law.

    The information conveyed to the FBI, which has not been previously reported, marks the earliest known instance of law enforcement officials being warned about Aldrich, and the shooting is the latest attack to raise questions about whether people who once caught the attention of law enforcement should have remained on the FBI’s radar.

    On the night of Nov. 19, more than a year after the assessment was closed, authorities said Aldrich entered the Club Q gay nightclub carrying an AR-15-style rifle and opened fire, killing five people and wounding 17 others before an Army veteran wrestled the attacker to the ground.

    An FBI assessment is the lowest level, least intrusive and most elementary stage of an FBI inquiry. Such assessments are routinely opened after agents receive a tip and investigators routinely face a challenge of sifting through which of the tens of thousands of tips received every year could yield a viable threat.

    There have been several high-profile examples of the FBI having received information about a gunman before a mass shooting. A month before Nikolas Cruz killed 17 people at a Florida high school, the bureau received a warning that he had been talking about committing a mass shooting. A man who massacred 49 people at an Orlando nightclub in 2016 and another who set off bombs in the streets of New York City the same year had each been looked at by federal agents but officials later determined they did not warrant continued law enforcement scrutiny.

    FBI guidelines meant to balance national security with civil liberties protections impose restrictions on the steps agents may take during the assessment phase. Agents, for instance, may analyze information from government databases and open-source internet searches, and can conduct interviews during an assessment. But they cannot turn to more intrusive techniques, such as requesting a wiretap or internet communications, without higher levels of approval and a more solid basis to suspect a crime.

    More than 10,000 assessments are opened each year. Many are closed within days or weeks when the FBI concludes there’s no criminal or national security threat, or basis for continued scrutiny. The system is meant to ensure that a person who has not broken the law does not remain under perpetual scrutiny on a mere hunch — and that the FBI can reserve its scarce resources for true threats.

    ———

    Associated Press writers Michael Balsamo and Lindsay Whitehurst contributed to this report from Washington.

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  • A man in New York has been arrested and charged with hate crime after Jewish father and son were targeted in BB gun shooting, official says | CNN

    A man in New York has been arrested and charged with hate crime after Jewish father and son were targeted in BB gun shooting, official says | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Police in New York have arrested a man accused of firing a BB gun at a Jewish father and son who were out grocery shopping, a law enforcement official told CNN.

    The alleged shooter, a 25-year-old man, is charged with assault as a hate crime, endangering the welfare of a child, reckless endangerment and assault, according to the official.

    The BB gun shooter was driving on a main thoroughfare on Staten Island Sunday afternoon when he spotted the 32-year-old father and his 7-year-old son shopping in front of a Kosher grocery store wearing yarmulkes, the official said.

    That is when the assailant allegedly opened fire, striking the boy in the right ear and the father in the chest, the official said.

    He then sped off in a Black Ford Mustang that did not have a license plate, the official said.

    Paramedics arrived at the scene a short time later and treated the pair for their injuries at the scene, the official said.

    In a Tuesday news conference, Staten Island District Attorney Michael McMahon said his office will continue working with police to bring justice to the victims.

    “We want our Jewish brothers and sisters to know in this instance that we stand with them just as we do with anyone who is a victim of a hate crime for any reason whatsoever,” McMahon told reporters on Tuesday.

    New York Mayor Eric Adams, speaking at the same news conference, said: “We are not going to allow hate to run our city.”

    The mayor added that New York has the largest Jewish population outside of Israel and that hate crimes have been on the rise across the country.

    “We need to stop what’s happening on social media, we need to stop the spreading of this hate, we need to combat it in a very real way,” Adams said.

    The alleged hate crime is the latest in a string of incidents in the city.

    The New York Police Department has seen an increase in overall hate crimes, led by a sharp increase in anti-Semitic incidents for the month of November. The NYPD reported 45 incidents in November, which is up from 20 crimes reported on November 2021, according to NYPD statistics.

    The increase in anti-Semitic incidents comes as the NYPD, along with other federal law enforcement agencies, thwarted a potential attack on a New York area synagogue last month, arresting and arraigning two men in connection with online threats.

    NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell said investigators from the FBI/NYPD Joint Terrorism Task Force and the NYPD Counterterrorism and Intelligence Bureau, in collaboration with law enforcement partners, uncovered “a developing threat to the Jewish community.”

    Authorities said they seized a number of weapons from the pair, who were also in possession of a swastika arm patch, according to a statement from Manhattan’s district attorney.

    New York state leads the nation in anti-Semitic incidents, with at least 416 reported in 2021, including at least 51 assaults – the highest number ever recorded by the Anti-Defamation League in New York. There were 12 assaults reported in 2020, the ADL said in an audit last month.

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  • Colorado gay club shooting suspect set to return to court

    Colorado gay club shooting suspect set to return to court

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    The suspect accused of entering a Colorado gay nightclub clad in body armor and opening fire with an AR-15-style rifle, killing five people and wounding 17 others, is set to appear in court again Tuesday

    DENVER — The suspect accused of entering a Colorado gay nightclub clad in body armor and opening fire with an AR-15-style rifle, killing five people and wounding 17 others, is set to appear in court again Tuesday to learn what charges prosecutors will pursue in the attack, including possible hate crime counts.

    Investigators say Anderson Lee Aldrich entered Club Q, a sanctuary for the LGBTQ community in the mostly conservative city of Colorado Springs, just before midnight on Nov. 19 and began shooting during a drag queen’s birthday celebration. The killing stopped after patrons wrestled the suspect to the ground, beating Aldrich into submission, they said.

    Aldrich, who is nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns according to defense court filings, was arrested at the club by police and held on suspicion of murder and hate crimes while District Attorney Michael Allen determined what charges to pursue against them. Allen has noted that murder charges would carry the harshest penalty — likely life in prison — and charging Aldrich with bias-motivated crimes would not lead to a harsher punishment.

    But at a Nov. 21 news conference, Allen did say that, if there was evidence to support bias motivated crimes, it was still important to pursue them to send the message “that we support communities that have been maligned, harassed, intimidated and abused.”

    According to witnesses, Aldrich fired first at people gathered at the club’s bar before spraying bullets across the dance floor during the attack, which came on the eve of an annual day of remembrance for transgender people lost to violence.

    More than a year before the shooting, Aldrich was arrested on allegations of making a bomb threat that led to the evacuation of about 10 homes. Aldrich threatened to harm their own family with a homemade bomb, ammunition and multiple weapons, authorities said at the time. Aldrich was booked into jail on suspicion of felony menacing and kidnapping, but the case was apparently later sealed and it’s unclear what became of the charges. There are no public indications that the case led to a conviction.

    Ring doorbell video obtained by the AP shows Aldrich arriving at their mother’s front door with a big black bag, telling her the police were nearby and adding, “This is where I stand. Today I die.”

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  • Colorado gay club shooting suspect charged with hate crimes

    Colorado gay club shooting suspect charged with hate crimes

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    COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) — The suspect accused of entering a Colorado gay nightclub clad in body armor and opening fire with an AR-15-style rifle, killing five people and wounding 17 others, was charged by prosecutors Tuesday with 305 criminal counts including hate crimes and murder.

    The counts against Anderson Lee Aldrich include 48 hate crime charges, one for each person known to have been in the club at the time.

    Investigators say Aldrich, 22, entered Club Q, a sanctuary for the LGBTQ community in the mostly conservative city of Colorado Springs, just before midnight on Nov. 19 and began shooting during a drag queen’s birthday celebration. The killing stopped after patrons wrestled the suspect to the ground, beating Aldrich into submission, they said.

    Aldrich sat upright during Tuesday’s hearing and appeared alert. In an earlier court appearance just a few days after the shooting, the defendant was slumped over — head and face covered with bruises — and had to be prompted by attorneys to respond to questions from a judge.

    The shooting came more than a year after Aldrich was arrested following a standoff with SWAT teams after authorities say Aldrich threatened to stockpile guns, ammo and body armor to become the “next mass killer.” But charges were dropped, the record is sealed and prosecutors say they can’t legally talk about what happened.

    Of the 48 hate crime charges, 27 counts involve injuries and 21 involve people fearing injury or property damage. In addition to those killed or wounded by gunfire, police have said five people had non-gunshot injuries and other victims had “no visible injuries.”

    00:00

    <p>At a hearing, prosecutor Michael Allen tells the judge they may seek additional charges against alleged Colorado Springs nightclub gunman Anderson Lee Aldrich, as discovery moves forward.</p>

    Club Q’s co-owner, Matthew Haynes, said the filing of 305 charges “graphically illustrates how heinous and horrific this attack was on our community.”

    To Haynes, dozens of letters on his desk filled with negative comments, some saying the shooter was doing God’s work, reinforces his concerns about those he said propagate hate.

    “Those feelings are still not condoned by the far-right, the leaders are not unanimously standing up in this country and saying, ‘Hey, no hate, this is too much,’” said Haynes. “How many more victims does there have to be?”

    Aldrich had been held on hate crime charges following the attack but prosecutors had said previously they weren’t sure whether those counts would stick because they needed to assess if there was adequate evidence to show it was a bias motivated crime.

    District Attorney Michael Allen had noted that murder charges would carry the harshest penalty — likely life in prison — but also said it was important to show the community that bias motivated crimes are not tolerated if evidence supports the charge.

    At a news conference after the hearing, Allen declined to discuss what evidence prosecutors found to back the hate crimes counts. However, he said a recent change in Colorado law allows offenders to be charged with hate crimes even if they are only partially motivated by bias.

    “If it was not for that change we would probably not be able to charge it in this case,” he said.

    Judge Michael McHenry ordered the arrest warrant affidavit to be unsealed Wednesday, over the objections defense attorney Joseph Archambault who cited concern’s about his client’s right to a fair trial due to publicity surrounding the case.

    Aldrich is nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns, according to defense court filings. They were arrested at the club by police and have not entered a plea or spoken about the events.

    Allen said the suspect being nonbinary was “part of the picture” in considering hate crime charges but he wouldn’t elaborate.

    “We are not going to tolerate actions against community members based on their sexual identity,” Allen said. “Members of that community have been harassed, intimidated and abused for too long.”

    Experts say a nonbinary individual can be charged with a hate crime for targeting fellow members of the LGBTQ community because hate crime laws are focused on the victims, not the suspect. But obtaining a hate crime conviction can be difficult, because prosecutors must prove what motivated the defendant, a higher standard than usually required in court.

    Colorado prosecutors will need concrete evidence such as statements Aldrich may have made about the shooting, said Frank Pezzella, an associate professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.

    “It’s got to be more than (they) shot up Club Q,” he said.

    Haynes said he is encouraged by assurances offered by the district attorney to prosecute the case to the full extent of the law.

    The co-owner, who remembers Christian protesters outside Club Q when it first opened in 2003, also lauded police and the FBI for being sensitive to victims’ preferred pronouns and chosen names. He added that the mayor’s office is working with the co-owners toward remodeling Club Q and installing a memorial for the victims.

    “Twenty years ago this would have been very, very different,” said Haynes.

    According to witnesses, Aldrich fired first at people gathered at the club’s bar before spraying bullets across the dance floor during the attack, which came on the eve of an annual day of remembrance for transgender people targeted by violence.

    ——

    Associated Press writer Jesse Bedayn contributed to this report from Denver. Bedayn is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

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  • Man pleads guilty to federal hate crime for cross burning

    Man pleads guilty to federal hate crime for cross burning

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    JACKSON, Miss. — A Mississippi man who burned a cross in his front yard to intimidate his Black neighbors pleaded guilty to a hate crime in federal court, the Justice Department announced Friday.

    Axel Cox, 24, of Gulfport, was charged with violating the Fair Housing Act over the December 2020 incident, according to court records.

    The Justice Department said Cox gathered supplies from his home, put together a wooden cross in his front yard and propped it up so his Black neighbors could see it. He then doused it with motor oil and lit it on fire. He also addressed the family with racially derogatory language, records say.

    A grand jury indicted him in September. Cox’s attorney, Jim Davis, filed a notice of intent for him to plead guilty to the cross burning on Nov. 22, 2022. Davis did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday.

    Davis told the Biloxi Sun Herald that Cox was reacting to his neighbors allegedly shooting and killing his dog. He added that his client acted “totally inappropriately.”

    The Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist groups have long practiced cross burnings to intimidate Black and Jewish people.

    “Burning a cross invokes the long and painful history, particularly in Mississippi, of intimidation and impending physical violence against Black people,” said Kristen Clarke, assistant attorney general of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “The Department of Justice will continue to prosecute those who use racially motivated violence to drive people away from their homes or communities.”

    A sentencing hearing is scheduled for March 9. Cox faces a maximum of 10 years in prison, a fine of up to $250,000 or both, according to the Justice Department

    The Gulfport Police Department and the FBI Jackson Field Office investigated the case.

    ———

    Michael Goldberg is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/mikergoldberg.

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