{"id":32373,"date":"2022-06-02T13:00:36","date_gmt":"2022-06-02T13:00:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cjstudents.com\/index.php\/2022\/06\/02\/why-high-profile-attacks-on-sfs-asian-communities-rarely-lead-to-hate-crime-charges\/"},"modified":"2022-06-02T13:00:36","modified_gmt":"2022-06-02T13:00:36","slug":"why-high-profile-attacks-on-sfs-asian-communities-rarely-lead-to-hate-crime-charges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cjstudents.com\/index.php\/2022\/06\/02\/why-high-profile-attacks-on-sfs-asian-communities-rarely-lead-to-hate-crime-charges\/","title":{"rendered":"Why High-Profile Attacks on SF’s Asian Communities Rarely Lead to Hate-Crime Charges"},"content":{"rendered":"

[ad_1]<\/p>\n

\n

Brooke Jenkins, a former assistant district attorney who is now a spokesperson of the recall effort against Boudin, is also a former hate crimes prosecutor in the DA\u2019s office. She said hate crime charges could have been pursued in Zhou\u2019s case using the hateful slur captured on video.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn my view, in that case, it did meet the bar,\u201d Jenkins said. \u201cThere were statements that made the intentions very clear, and [made] the motivations very clear.\u201d<\/p>\n

Grayson and Zhou ultimately did not participate in a restorative justice process together, as they initially intended. That process would\u2019ve seen the two men reconcile their differences, sitting together and talking out what happened. In their description of the goal of the San Francisco Restorative Justice Collaborative<\/a>, the DA\u2019s office specifically points to the method as a practice to encourage multiracial consensus, and global racial solidarity, particularly aiming to repair the relationship between Asian American and African American communities in San Francisco.<\/p>\n

In short, it was a process designed to address moments of hate just like this one.<\/p>\n

Instead, authorities steered Grayson into another restorative justice path: neighborhood courts. It\u2019s known as a \u201cdiversion\u201d program that focuses on rehabilitation and urges participants to take accountability.<\/p>\n

Zhou and Grayson couldn\u2019t be reached for comment for this story.<\/p>\n

Amerson, who was charged with second-degree robbery and inflicting injury on an elder, was released of his own recognizance with a GPS-tracked ankle monitor. His case is still ongoing.<\/p>\n

Notably, Amerson lacked a permanent home when he was arrested for attacking Zhou. He was \u201cmostly transient,\u201d his attorney wrote in a 2020 declaration to the court. Only after his arrest was he able to secure housing, his lawyer wrote, and has been \u201cdoing well.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boudin touts hate crime charges, even when he’s dropped them<\/h2>\n

The question of when to charge hate crimes has become a source of contention in the recall election against Boudin. In his own defense, Boudin\u2019s pinned Tweet<\/a> highlights a video quoting the San Francisco Chronicle, \u201c … beating of Asian father was a hate crime, Boudin decides.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"A
A screenshot from a No on H campaign ad featuring a San Francisco Chronicle article. (Courtesy Chesa No on H campaign)<\/cite><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But a review of court records by The Standard and KQED shows the hate crime he charged against suspect Sidney Hammond, who allegedly assaulted an Asian father with a baby stroller on April 30, 2021, were eventually dropped.<\/p>\n

The DA\u2019s office verified as much, and explained that, after charging, they received additional evidence that did not support hate crime charges, including a San Francisco police officer stating in a report that the incidents were not hate motivated. As such, the office was \u201cethically obligated\u201d to dismiss the hate crime enhancement.<\/p>\n

And no hate-related charges were pursued against the suspect who kicked Liao out of his walker in Tenderloin. According to the latest court documents, Ramos-Hernandez has been referred to mental health treatment and was released with a GPS tracking monitor.<\/p>\n

The suspect pushing Ratanapakdee to death, Antoine Watson, remained in custody and is charged with murder. No hate crime-related charges were filed.<\/p>\n

Jenkins, who is one of Boudin\u2019s toughest critics, pointed out the importance of charging hate crimes but also acknowledged that hate crimes are notoriously difficult to charge because they hinge on proving intent.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you feel like you\u2019re being targeted for that reason, they want to feel vindicated,\u201d said Jenkins. She added that victims of the crime want to see charges that truly capture and reflect the \u201cfull scope of someone’s conduct.\u201d<\/p>\n

But hate crimes are \u201cone of the only charges that require the DA\u2019s Office to prove motive for the underlying crime,\u201d she said. In other words, it requires that someone has made a verbal expression regarding the victim\u2019s identity, or shows a clear pattern of targeting over time.<\/p>\n

There are two cases charged with hate crimes, among the dozen reviewed by KQED and The Standard, and both of them reflect those patterns.<\/p>\n

A serial vandalism suspect, Derik Barreto, was charged by DA Boudin for nearly 30 counts of hate crimes as he allegedly targeted Asian-owned businesses, breaking their windows. Barreto provided a lengthy interview with the police explicitly saying he had some delusions \u201caround the surveillance capabilities of Chinese,\u201d court documents reveal. In this case, Barreto verbally admitted targeting Chinese-owned businesses.<\/p>\n

But the judge in the case ordered Barreto to be released, even though the DA\u2019s office opposed the decision. After missing his court date, he\u2019s now facing bench warrant arrest.<\/p>\n

The other case where hate crime charges emerged involved a suspect robbing multiple Asian women. The suspect, O\u2019Sean Garcia, allegedly showed a pattern of targeting victims with the same racial identity. Garcia was released, too, court records show.<\/p>\n

Data from the DA\u2019s office showed that a total of 20 cases included hate crime charges in 2021, both standalone misdemeanors and hate crime enhancements, which are tacked onto felonies.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unclear how many of those 20 cases in 2021 are categorized as anti-Asian as opposed to hate directed toward other identities.<\/p>\n

Of course, not every hateful incident is a crime, as the California Attorney General\u2019s Office laid out in a memo explaining the difference between the two.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe U.S. Constitution allows hate speech as long as it does not interfere with the civil rights of others,\u201d the office wrote in the advisory<\/a>. \u201cWhile these acts are certainly hurtful, they do not rise to the level of criminal violations and thus may not be prosecuted.\u201d<\/p>\n

Solving hate through community \u2014 and data<\/h2>\n

In mid-May, leaders from San Francisco\u2019s Chinese and Black communities came together at a press conference at Third Baptist Church in the Western Addition to urge authorities to pursue more hate crime charges.<\/p>\n

\u201cPublic safety is every human being\u2019s birthright,\u201d SFPD Capt. Yulanda Williams said. \u201cExploitation of our Asian-Pacific Islander community will no longer be tolerated.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Two
Yulanda Williams, an SFPD police captain speaking in her capacity as a civilian, address anti-AAPI hate crimes at a press conference at Third Baptist Church in San Francisco on May 9. (Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez\/KQED)<\/cite><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

That joint press conference between Black and Asian leaders at Third Baptist Church was convened with the idea that the Black community needed to stand in solidarity with Asian people in calling for more hate crime enhancements, upping the charges suspects face. But Tinisch Hollins, head of Californians for Safety and Justice, said sometimes people react to crime with efforts that ultimately perpetuate racism, and racial injustice.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere’s a very real sentiment that there are populations of individuals who cause problems and make the city and community unsafe and less desirable,\u201d Hollins said. \u201cAnd Black people, specifically Black men and boys, are at the top of that list.\u201d<\/p>\n

Indeed, the high-profile cases reviewed by KQED and the SF Standard feature a mix of suspects, across various ethnicities.<\/p>\n

While public discussion around Asian communities frequently references the need for more safety \u2014 pushing that word, “safety,” in particular \u2014 Hollins said that can be a societally palatable code for pushing out Black people.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018Public safety\u2019 right now, I feel like it\u2019s a very covert way of naming it,\u2019\u201d she said. It also focuses solutions on incarceration instead of giving mental health help, housing, and education to people who may need it in order to reduce incentives for crime.<\/p>\n

And, importantly, research shows steeper charges \u2014 which hate crime enhancements would bring \u2014 and longer sentencing don\u2019t reduce crime.<\/p>\n

Magnus Lofstrom, a senior fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California, said his research on Proposition 47<\/a>, which reduced some felony thefts and drug offenses to misdemeanors, has shown that reducing prison populations doesn\u2019t lead to a rise in violent crime.<\/p>\n

Hollins was raised in the Bayview where Zhou was attacked, and said she wasn\u2019t surprised that initial attempts to make peace between Zhou and Grayson bore no fruit. Immigrants, she finds, tend to be suspicious of those kinds of restorative justice approaches, which need community backing to really work.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we at all agreed that there are better ways to resolve the kind of social conflicts that come up in our communities, especially when racial tensions are involved,\u201d she said, \u201cyou might have a lot more buy-in.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both hate crimes and hate incidents are significantly underreported, Lofstrum added. Asian American and Pacific Islander immigrant communities face particular barriers to reporting due to insufficient language access.<\/p>\n

Underreporting is a phenomenon state officials are trying to fix.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n