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OAKLAND – John Lee Cowell apparently did not say anything until he hit two sisters with a knife on a BART platform Sunday, killing 18 … old Nia Wilson, according to the police. His only words to the detectives at the station after his arrest Monday were that he wanted a lawyer.
Although no motive of hatred has yet been associated with the assault, Cowell said Thursday that he did not need Alameda County. . District Attorney's Office to tell him what he already knows: Cowell is white and his nieces are black
"Racist motivation here is not a question for me," Ansar El Muhammad said Thursday. "The whole world knows that it was racially motivated."
This world includes many people in the black community who feel that their lives are in constant jeopardy in a society still prejudiced by celebrities like Anne Hathaway. , who invoked the white privilege in a withered tweet, to other social media who unequivocally state that Cowell targeted the sisters because of their race. "For a group of people who have such a history of "Being focused, that's the point of view where they look at the world." Phyllis Gerstenfeld, chair of the California State University's Criminal Justice Department, Stanislaus. "Many people honestly believe that it was motivated by the race. … Much is history and the fact that relations with the police are not very good. We are also in a situation where feelings on this subject are so strong in general. "
Historically a hotbed for social and political activism, Oakland has a history that is also full of racial tension, shootings between the police department and the Black Panther Party at the time of the assassination. Oscar Grant, an unarmed black man, by a white BART policeman nine years ago
Police shootings against unarmed African-Americans provoked thousands of protests in the streets, especially during the Black Lives Matter movement, a name coined by an Oakland activist.
Another form of racial tension has recently emerged, and critics say it is spreading. Oakland at the White House A neo-Nazi rally in Charlottesville, Virginia last year caused the death of a left-wing counter-protester, sparking national outrage when President Donald Trump Did not condemn the rally.
In Oakland, i It began in May. Police of a family of African-Americans doing barbecues in an area of Merritt Lake where coal burning was not allowed. The following month, a man nicknamed Joe the Jogger threw the affairs of a black homeless man into the lake. In San Francisco, a white woman called the authorities to complain about an 8-year-old black girl who was selling bottled water without a permit.
"It gets worse and worse every day," says Kenzie Smith, who was doing a barbecue on the lake this May day. "Now we have a death in our community, it is unacceptable, and I find that he did it out of hate."
On Monday, people gathered at MacArthur Station BART for a funeral to cry Nia Wilson, then about 1000 walked to a Uptown bar where white nationalists were supposed to have planned a meeting. The violence erupted briefly as the crowd attacked a white man, considered a white nationalist, and officers were wounded by fireworks.
On Thursday, rabies turned to KTVU, the Oakland-based news channel. insensitive photo of Wilson. The photo claimed that she was holding a gun, but friends said it was a cell phone case shaped like a gun.
Marching from downtown to Jack London Square headquarters, reporters handed a list of six requests to KTVU reporter Paul Chambers, who met with Wilson family members . Oakland community leader and rapper Mistah Fab. Mistah Fab said the media treated the victim as a suspect and ignored Cowell's social media posts. Critics have said that a Facebook page that they say belongs to Cowell under a different name has shown him wearing gold bars on his teeth.
"I checked his Facebook, they erased it now," said Mistah Fab. He said that Cowell was addicted to black culture and hip hop. "They do not make him look like a thug, why do not they release the videos of him dropping the N-Bomb?"
Mistah Fab, also known as Stanley Cox, then read a message that KTVU's news director, Amber Eikel, sent him. Eikel said that one person was responsible for selecting the photo, which she called a "horrible" decision and "split second". Eikel is excused in the private message, said Mistah Fab.
Eikel did not respond to an email from this news organization seeking a comment
Khafre Jay, founder and executive director of Hip Hop 4 Change, said that the African-American community often represented negatively, even if the person is a victim of a crime.
"I'm just angry," he said. "They continue to call it an error.This is not a mistake."
Supporters who demand justice for Wilson also fear that Cowell is already working on a criminal defense against mental illness. told KRON-TV that he had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
Gerstenfeld, who conducted extensive research on hate crimes, said that a diagnosis of mental illness did not occur. Would not prevent Cowell – or anyone else – from being found guilty of hate crime She added that hate crime cases are hard to prove
There were 1,093 hate crimes in California in 2017, an increase of 17.4% over 2016, according to a report from the Attorney General's Office.Of the 383 hate crimes that were brought to justice in 2017, 195 were eventually classified as crimes. of hate and 76 as crimes motivated by Of the 124 cases for which information was available for the report, only 65 were hate crime convictions. The rest were other convictions or non-convictions.
"It's the only crime that really forces you to prove the motive," Gerstenfeld said. "You must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that they are motivated by the group of victims."
The writer Annie Sciacca contributed to the report.
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