By Rick Rodriguez
A few months back, Ruben Navarette, a syndicated national columnist writing for the San Diego Union, reported on a tragic death of an individual beaten to death at the hands of four white men. The four white men were according to reports "All-American Boys on the football team that get good grades." The victim was an "illegal Mexican." Apparently, there are contentions, according to witnesses, that the death occurred while the perpetrators shouted ethnic and racial castigations at the deceased.
Typically, these stories don't surprise me as we see these types of acts committed frequently throughout society. And, I am not partial to any ethnicity; however, in this case, the perpetrators happen to be white and the victim is for lack of a better word Hispanic. What puzzles and disturbs me is the continuance of these acts that wreak of ethnic hate. Why must we continue to endure the harness of racism that envelopes our daily lives, and forms our daily perceptions. Is or will there ever be harmony among people of different races/ethnicities? Moreover, equally puzzling is the verdicts that juries put forth after hearing all the evidence. Equally disturbing is how juries arrive at verdicts especially when ethnic relations are involved.
Navarette, San Ramon Valley Times 5/14/2009 P.A12 " In most parts of the country, the cowardly and hateful act of beating someone to death--while shouting racial slurs, according to witnesses--would be called by its proper name: murder. Curiously, though in Pennsylvania's Schuylkill County, an all-white jury came up with another name for it : simple assault."
So, of course I couldn't let that slip past me without my two cents. Here's what I wrote to the San Ramon Valley Times and it was published in this morning's paper:
San Ramon Valley Times 5/20/2009 "Assault?" by Rick Rodriguez
"Let me get this straight (columnist Ruben Navarette Times May 14): Four white guys beat up one brown guy. The brown guy ends up dead. Two white guys are charged with assault. The other two are still in trouble. Assault? Legal definition of assault: "A crime that occurs when one person tries to physically harm another in a way that makes the person under attack feel immediately threatened. Actual physical contact is not necessary; threatening gestures that would alarm any reasonable person can constitute assault." I see. And one brown guy ends up dead!"
Here, my argument is for the lack of justice for the deceased. He was an illegal immigrant; something I vehemently oppose, a father of two children, and he was brutally murdered. Of course, I was not present in the court house to hear all sides of the story; yet, somehow this verdict wreaks of injustice. If "assault" does not have to include even an act of physical contact; how is it that these four men would only be charged with assault and not murder? How is it that a man could be beaten to death under these circumstances and we as "Americans" are not screaming at the top of our lungs for justice? Well, here I am "screaming at the top of my lungs" for a man I never met and for a story that never seems to end!
