For the Record
A sampling of hate crimes and hate group activities from the second quarter of 2015 is summarized in state-by-state listings.
Incidents of apparent hate crimes and hate group activities listed here are drawn primarily from media sources. These incidents include only a fraction of the almost 260,000 reported and unreported hate crimes that a 2012 Bureau of Justice Statistics report estimated occur annually. This listing carries a selection of incidents from May through August 2015. Any additional listings can be found on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s website. splcenter.org/get-informed/hate-incidents
CALIFORNIA
Palo Alto · July 15, 2015
A group of white men allegedly stabbed a Latino teen with a screwdriver in a parking garage after making offensive remarks about his ethnicity.
Rialto · May 3, 2015
Jeremiah Bell, a 22-year-old black man, was charged with attempted murder and hate crime allegations after he allegedly beat a white man with a baseball bat.
Sacramento · June 27, 2015
Jose Alvarez Espinoza, 34, was charged with assault, making willful threats and attempted offense because of race, color or religion after he allegedly used a racial slur and assaulted a woman on the street.
Stanford · June 26, 2015
Lucas Joseph Ninow, 19, was charged with felony vandalism, misdemeanor vandalism and hate crime for allegedly spray-painting racist graffiti and swastikas on Stanford University student housing units.
COLORADO
Boulder · May 7, 2015
Jeffrey Klinkel, 32, was charged with felony menacing, explosive or biological hoax, and interference with an educational facility for allegedly sending envelopes with threatening messages and a white powder to a Jewish community center and synagogue in early April.
Boulder · May 13, 2015
Paul Wettengel, 45, was charged with third degree assault and bias-motivated crime for allegedly assaulting a 21-year-old transgender man.
FLORIDA
Miami Beach · June 6, 2015
A swastika and anti-Semitic message were scrawled on a car.
ILLINOIS
DuPage County · June 22, 2015
Karen Komar, 49, was charged with three felony hate crime counts and three misdemeanor counts of aggravated assault after she allegedly used racial slurs and pointed a weapon at three teenagers, two black and one white, on a sidewalk.
Plainfield · May 11, 2015
Andrew M. Machaj, 22, was charged with a hate crime and criminal damage to property for allegedly spray-painting a racial slur and swastika at the residence of several Western Illinois University students.
LOUISIANA
Clinton · July 25, 2015
Ronnie Barnes, 54, was charged with a hate crime and a misdemeanor after allegedly using a racial slur and questioning the gender of a 12-year-old boy.
MICHIGAN
Troy · May 1, 2015
James Duane Tree, 53, was charged with ethnic intimidation and assault and battery after allegedly using ethnic slurs and threatening to kill a Muslim man.
MISSISSIPPI
George County · June 2, 2015
Joshua Vallum, 28, was charged with murder for allegedly beating a transgender teen to death.
Jackson · May 8, 2015
Robert Henry Rice was sentenced to 10 years in prison for his involvement in a conspiracy in a string of assaults in 2011 that targeted black residents.
Moss Point · July 11, 2015
The letters “KKK” and white power were spray-painted on city signs.
NEW YORK
Buffalo · May 5, 2015
A threatening note with racist insults was wrapped around a brick and thrown through a window of an interracial couple’s residence.
Lake Luzerne · June 14, 2015
Scott D. Bills, 19, and Bradley S. Moulton, 21, were charged with second-degree menacing as a hate crime after allegedly firing a BB gun at two men and shouting anti-gay slurs.
Long Island · July 2, 2015
Elisa Pellino, 66, was charged with second degree aggravated harassment as a hate crime after allegedly leaving a racist telephone message at a church.
New York · May 5, 2015
A gay couple at a restaurant was allegedly assaulted by two men who used anti-gay slurs.
New York · June 1, 2015
Rolan Reid was charged with a hate crime for shoving a transgender woman onto subway tracks.
New York · June 19, 2015
A group of black men allegedly attacked a white man on the street while yelling racial slurs.
New York · July 11, 2015
Zin McDade, 29, allegedly punched a woman on the street while yelling anti-Muslim insults.
New York · Aug. 4, 2015
The first gay couple married at West Point was allegedly attacked by a man yelling anti-gay slurs.
NORTH CAROLINA
Charlotte · June 25, 2015
A predominantly African American church was set afire only weeks after nine worshippers at a historic Charleston African American church were shot and killed by white supremacist Dylann Roof.
OREGON
Portland · July 2, 2015
Jeremiah Mauer, 31, was sentenced to 13 years in prison after pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit murder and second degree assault stemming from a 2014 incident in which he fired shots into a residence. Mauer was the founder of the United Aryan Empire, a white supremacist gang responsible for a number of fights and shootings last year.
SOUTH CAROLINA
Columbia · July 18, 2015
Members of the Loyal White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan and the neo-Nazi National Socialist Movement held a pro-Confederate flag rally at the state capital. Earlier in the day, members of the New Black Panther Party demonstrated against the flag.
TENNESSEE
Memphis · May 7, 2015
A letter with a swastika on the envelope that threatened to blow up the Memphis Gay and Lesbian Community Center was left in the center’s mailbox.
WASHINGTON
Seattle · June 28, 2015
Three unrelated hate crimes targeting gay men and a transgender woman occurred hours apart on the same day hundreds of people attended the annual gay pride parade in downtown.
Seattle · July 7, 2015
Jeffrey Brooks Knothe, 57, was charged with malicious harassment after he allegedly used gay and racial slurs and spit on a gay couple and a black woman on a city bus.
Spokane · July 4, 2015
Anti-Muslim graffiti was spray-painted on the wall of a community center where Bosnia Herzegovina Heritage Association members were observing Ramadan.
WEST VIRGINIA
Huntington · May 6, 2015
Steward Butler, 23, was charged with civil rights violations and battery for allegedly attacking two gay men.
