Video footage shows the teen running at Ratanapakdee and pushing him over, knocking him to the ground. There was no evidence depicted that the elderly man did anything to provoke the attack. The Department of Police stated that they identified Watson quickly. Mayor London Breed and Speaker Nancy Pelosi offered condolences. In a New York Times article, Boudin says Antoine Watson was having "some sort of temper tantrum," a term more often used to describe toddlers, ABC7 reported. An uneasiness had hung over her ever since a mob descended on the Capitol early that month, though really, people had been acting crazy for a year. Monthanus offered me a pastry and asked if I had seen the latest news, about the 64-year-old Asian woman in Riverside, Calif., who was stabbed in the stomach while walking her dogs and later died of her injuries. pg.acq.push(function() { Amy Ratanapakdee thanked San Francisco police for quickly finding and arresting 19-year-old Antoine Watson and 20-year-old Malaysia Goo for her father's attack and subsequent death. a 91-year-old shoved to the ground in Chinatown in Oakland, Calif., a white gunman in the Atlanta area drove to several businesses and shot eight people to death. San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin hassparked outrage on social mediaafter telling the New York Times that 19-year-old AntoineWatsonwas "in some sort of a temper tantrum" when he allegedly attacked84-year-oldThai immigrant Vichar Ratanapakdee. I want to know what happened. The Oakland attacks came as many in the Bay Area began changing their social media photos to bring awareness to the seemingly unprovoked killing of an 84-year-old Thai man in San Francisco last month. Poypiti Amatatham contributed reporting from Bangkok. It was then that Mr. Vicha walked up Anzavista Avenue, a street with views of skyscrapers in the citys financial district. . 2023 FOX News Network, LLC. Investigators interviewed some 100 people and reviewed 175,000 computer files, some of which indicated that the gunman had visited white-supremacist websites. One witness at the scene told officers that he saw a Black male, 18 to 30 years old, approach and stand over an elderly man lying on the ground. Monthanus sat on her bed that evening with Eric and their 11-year-old son, Titus, Googling her fathers age and the cross street where she found the stain. Youre not doing it right, her mother snapped at one point, grabbing the brush. The neighborhood of Anza Vista, tucked on a hilltop away from traffic, was usually quiet. San Francisco's district attorney charged Antoine Watson, the 19-year-old accused of shoving Vicha to death, with murder and elder abuse. In the next life, I hope Ill get to be your daughter again. eventCategory: event.slot.getSlotElementId(), After Vicha died, Eric says, he saw so many videos, video after video of attacks in the news. 2023 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. Crime data from the district attorney offices in San Francisco County and Alameda County, which includes Oakland, show that people of Asian descent were less likely last year to be victims of crimes than other ethnic groups. }); When we go to the beach we can dream that he is with us., She plans to bring the other urn back to her fathers hometown in southern Thailand, where the local Buddhist temple has a stupa that holds the familys remains. Two hours later, Antoine finally entered the room. The whole family is in deep agony, Jennifer Steiner, a longtime friend whom Antoines mother chose to speak on her behalf, told me. In recent years, the Asian percentage of the Bayviews population has become five times as large as it was in 1980, while the Black share has shrunk by more than half. There was barely a moment to grieve. What made her father bleed out like that? When Monthanus had a gripe with the landlord or a stranger who crossed her, he would tell her to let it go, to leave it to karma. MEAWW brings you the best content from its global team of Someone had been falsely claiming to reporters that he was Vichas son and spoke on behalf of the family about what would happen to his remains. Monthanus wore a black wool cloak over a pleated dress that flew up as the boat pulled away from the dock. Many are outraged after an 84-year-old Asian man was killed in San Francisco, and the District Attorney, Chesa Boudin, justified the actions of the killer. Breed spoke of the shock she felt seeing the brutal assault of Ratanapakdee on video and offered her sympathies to the family. What kind of person would do this? After the funeral, Monthanus and Eric hired a therapist to help Titus he had not cried and seldom said anything about the episode. } Now all that remained was the memory of him, the sound of his voice in her head. }); SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA: A teenager charged in the brutal assault of an 84-year-old San Francisco man that was captured on video in January 2021, will remain in custody following a court hearing on Monday, February 15. Titus, dressed in a black suit and a pair of his grandfathers leather loafers that fit tight around his growing feet, chased his little brother around the deck. "But when you cross that line, when you commit murder, when you take someone's life like that, we as a city and as a society have to hold you accountable for your actions. This arrest data includes all information on current and previous arrests for Antoine Watson In the past year, researchers and activist groups have tallied thousands of racist incidents against Asian-Americans, a surge in hate that they link to former President Donald J. Trump repeatedly referring to the coronavirus as the Chinese virus. Mr. Vichas family described his killing as racially motivated, and it spurred a campaign to raise awareness by many prominent Asian-Americans, who used the online hashtags #JusticeForVicha and #StopAsianHate. That evening, the couple stood at the doorway to her fathers room on the third-floor intensive-care unit. Eric held her, and she held her sons. How could it have been prevented? hitType: 'event', He said she didnt want to go to court; she just wanted to bury it. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, Since his retirement in 1996 from Kasikornbank, one of Thailands largest financial institutions, Mr. Vicha had traveled between San Francisco, where his eldest daughter lives, and Thailand, where his youngest does. After her graduation, when Ms. Monthanus married and decided to stay in San Francisco, Mr. Vicha and his wife came to help raise their grandchildren. According to the San Francisco District Attorney's office, Watson had been observed and contacted by San Francisco Police officers earlier that Thursday morning for traffic infractions resulting in a minor collision. ", ABC7's Dion Lim spoke with Ratanapakdee's family that said a temper tantrum is "no excuse" for murdering someone. She tried calling it. A photograph of Vicha Ratanapakdee that hangs in his daughters home. The court system, which they thought would deliver swift justice, was confoundingly slow. Monthanus agreed, even as her worry turned to panic. But Jeung grew wary when a doctor asked him if he had recently been to China, and again when he learned that his relatives had been marooned at a hotel near the airport after being told they couldnt board their flight back home. A test soon showed that they had H1N1, a common strain of influenza, and their symptoms subsided within a week. "Our officers identified our suspect as 19-year-old Antoine Watson of Daly City. About an hour later, Mr. Vicha, an 84-year-old retired auditor from Thailand, was violently slammed to the ground by a man who charged into him at full speed. Earlier that week, two more videos emerged from New York City of a man in Times Square stomping on a woman on her way to church; of a man punching and choking another man on the J train. On the morning of Jan. 28, when Monthanus and the children were still asleep, he prepared to head out. Here is a photo of Vicha Ratanapakdee, who was killed in a shocking attack last week in San Francisco. Saturday evening at approximately 8:45 p.m., officers served a search warrant on the 500 block of Lisbon Street in Daly City and located Watson and Goo, who were arrested without incident. Vicha was one of only a few people in the village who spoke English well, Mr. Surachai said. If you miss Grandpa, she told him, go to his photo and say hi. Troy walked up to two framed portraits of his grandfather that now hung side by side on the wall. They have any language to help anybody.. The video shows that the elderly man had no opportunity to protect himself, Assistant District Attorney Sean Connolly wrote in a motion seeking to detain Watson. He had just gone to dinner with a few relatives visiting from Beijing. Most of the victims were Asian.. Mr. Vicha went on to study at Thammasat University in Bangkok, one of the countrys most prestigious institutions. Three monks carried piles of orchids and roses, a framed photo of Vicha and a forest green box holding his remains. arrested and chargedwith murder and elder abuse. The future me, the real me, says, I wish we could forgive everybody, and everybody should acknowledge this bad thing happened. And right now it feels like, maybe, his family sees me as an enemy. First published on February 8, 2021 / 3:17 PM. The San Francisco District Attorney has filed murder charges and elder abuse causing death charges against the 19-year-old suspect in the case, Antoine Watson, calling the crime a "brutal . Four of the victims were Sikh, prompting calls to examine whether the gunman was motivated by bias. $300,000 a year is roughly what a family of four needs to earn to live a middle-class lifestyle in the Bay Area. eventAction: 'click_adunit' She could feel the weight of the pandemic starting to lift, but where there had once been anticipation, she now felt dread. eventAction: 'render' Her father had been assaulted and taken to a hospital, a police officer said. ga('create', 'UA-67136960-15', 'auto', 'ads'); (CBS), deadly attack of Vicha Ratanapakdee in the city's Anza Vista neighborhood on January 28, pled not guilty to charges of murder and elder abuse causing death, and that any perpetrators would "be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law,", Public File for KBCW-TV / KBCW 44 Cable 12. For months Mr. Vicha had been pining to return to Thailand but was unable to because of the pandemic. Eric complimented his vest and said he thought about wearing his. Hes 19 years old to be in jail. She thought about her father in the back of the car with the kids, their banter when she got ready for work in the morning. window.googletag.pubads().addEventListener('slotOnload', function(event) { New images have continued to surface on a weekly, sometimes daily, basis. The suspects have been identified as Antoine Watson, 19, and Maylasia Goo, 20, both of . He often lightened the mood after she argued with her husband, teasing that his daughter talked too much. CALIFORNIADA RESPONDS TO ATTACKS AGAINST ELDERLY ASIANS, AS ACTIVISTS CLAIM CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC TO BLAME, A spokesperson for Boudin clarified that his comment was made "regardingMr. Watsons behavior prior to the murder" and that Boudin "charged the killing of Mr. Ratanapakdee as a murder, the most serious crime on the books.". It appears that the defendant was in some sort of a temper tantrum, Mr. Boudin said. A web camera streamed the ceremony for friends and family abroad. Court documents give the victims name as Gilbert Diaz, and Carl Chan, a community leader and president of the Oakland Chinatown Chamber of Commerce, said the victim was Latino. SAN FRANCISCO (CN) Following shockingly brutal attacks that left two elderly men dead last week, San Francisco officials on Tuesday sought to dispel perceptions that the city is soft on crime under the administration of a progressive, reform-minded district attorney. On January 29, 2021, investigators obtained an arrest warrant for Watson for 245(a)1 PC - Assault with a Deadly Weapon and 368(b)1 PC - Elder Abuse causing . The suspect, Antoine Watson, was arrested and charged with murder and is pending trial. San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin said he plans to file murder . Boudin, who started his term just a few months before the lockdown, in January 2020, inherited more than 5,000 criminal prosecutions. Maylasia Goo also arrested. But the overwhelming majority of hate-crime perpetrators are white.). It also encourages those agencies to raise awareness about the impact of hate crimes and the services available to victims. There had been so many attacks since the one on her father. A representative for the San Francisco Police Department told FOX News that the agency is unable to confirm that the documents obtained by Lim are police documents. She had always looked to her father when something troubled her conscience. }); She wanted to be strong for her sons, but she had trouble sleeping at night and broke into tears unexpectedly. In the United States and elsewhere, private schools asked their Chinese international students not to return for the spring semester; shopkeepers turned away customers who appeared Asian; Chinatowns emptied. Inside, Monthanus held her composure as her frustration grew. Let's dispel the myth right now that there are no consequences for committing crimes in San Francisco," Breed said. San Francisco (BCN) . Antoine turned around and smiled again, until the door closed on him. Police arrested two people Saturday in connection with Thursday's filmed attack that left an elderly California man dead. Some assailants have yelled slurs while throwing a punch or slashing at their victims with a knife. Solidarity is what it should be, she says. A San Francisco man accused of killing an 84-year-old Thai grandfather in an attack that galvanized Asian Americans and helped spur a successful recall of the city's liberal prosecutor was ordered . }); "I can't even imagine what his family is going through right now. Monthanus pulled him close, from behind; she didnt want him to see her crying. A nurse came in and explained that the surgeon hadnt been able to stop the bleeding. These shifts werent always visible, but they were there beneath the influx or exodus, beneath the mistrust and grievances, beneath what each person, Black or Asian, took away from the images of attacks flooding the news. Considering him being 19 or even older now, he is no longer a child and is capable enough to keep his hands to himself. It was just the way that he answered the question that made me feel like he didnt really care about our emotions, about what we were asking about., Boudin, who couldnt discuss the particulars of the case, understood where Eric and Monthanus were coming from. He must be happy now, because hes not coming back anymore! And sometimes, when they were alone and the guilt swelled inside Monthanus, she fell apart. Mr. Watsons lawyer, Sliman Nawabi, a public defender, said his client would not have been able to identify Mr. Vichas ethnicity through his face mask, cap and winter clothing. He died shortly after being rushed to a hospital. And the fact that another human being would do that to an elderly senior in our community is one of the most disgusting things I've ever seen," said the mayor. One witness at the scene told officers that he saw . The trust-building really took us 10 years, Wan says. The video was taken from the same angle as the clip that everyone saw, only this footage was longer. They scrubbed the sidewalk with brushes and wondered why no one from the city had come to do the same. I want to know the truth. Within one week of the websites start, Stop AAPI Hate received 673 reports of verbal and physical attacks, as well as other forms of harassment, like spitting, coughing and online threats. The fatal assault in San Francisco on a defenseless older man was the latest terrifying episode for Asian-Americans, many of whom have endured racist taunts, rants and worse during the pandemic. But let's try to make it work anyway. who was violently pushed and killed by Antoine Watson in . she trailed off and let out a deep sigh. She thought about Antoine, knowing there were people in his life who loved him. This January, Vicha was eager to regain his stamina after a recent series of heart operations, so that he could walk again for longer distances. He has pled not guilty to charges of murder and elder abuse causing death. Watson has reportedlypleaded not guilty to the incident but his lawyer admits that his client had an "outburst of rage. At the time of the attack, Mr. Vicha was only months away from being able to return to Thailand. Anyone can read what you share. Walking was how he explored San Francisco when he first arrived there from Thailand in 2000, to spend a year with Monthanus while she attended business school, and again in 2018, to help take care of her two sons. Lucas Manfredi is a general assignment reporter for Fox News. "Racism has once again proven deadly" An elderly Thai man was knocked down and killed by a teenager in San Francisco. Last week, Mayor London Breed, joined by Police Chief Bill Scott and District Attorney Chesa Boudin, said violence in San Francisco would not be tolerated and that any perpetrators would "be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law," especially those who targeted children or the elderly. The killing of a Thai man in America has given voice to a united community under the umbrella of an Asian-American identity. 3 min read. Video footage shows the teen running at Ratanapakdee and pushing him over, knocking him to the ground. When they got home, he pulled out her phone, and instead of putting on his usual cartoons, he scrolled through her photos. He has pleaded not guilty but his lawyer admits that his client had an outburst of rage.. By then, Boudin had told reporters that there was no evidence from the police suggesting that Vichas death was motivated by racial animus. Believe Attack Was Racially Motivated., Vichas story joined a cluster of reports about attacks on Asian elders in four cities. assault in Western Addition that led to the death an 84-year-old man, police said. We said, Dad, we are going to go back soon! Ms. Monthanus recalled. Antoine Watson of Daly City, age 21, was arrested for Murder Assault w/Deadly Weapon Or Assault w/Force Likely To Produce GBI Elder Or Dependent Adult Abuse in San Francisco County, California on January 30, 2021 by San Francisco County Sheriff. San Francisco District Attorneys office stated that Watson had been observed and contacted by San Francisco Police officers earlier that morning for traffic violations following a minor collision and was issued a citation. LAPD INVESTIGATES KOREATOWN ASSAULT ON AIR FORCE VETERAN DENNY KIM AS POSSIBLE HATE CRIME, According to theTimes, Boudin saidthatRatanapakdee'sdeath was heinous, but that there is no evidence to suggest the attackwas motivated by racial animus. Antoine Watson appears in court during a previous hearing. And once I hear that, I dont think we have a choice but to accept it., I dont know if we can, you know, let him go, he added. There is absolutely zero evidence that Mr. Ratanapakdees ethnicity and age was a motivating factor in being assaulted, Nawabi said. But what brought her out to the rallies, more than anything, was her desire for someone to answer for the loss of her father. Former President Donald Trump repeatedly described the coronavirus or COVID-19 as the "Chinese virus," a reference to its outbreak from Wuhan, China. One was that there was a pattern of Black perpetrators and Asian victims, that the pattern was a symptom of a tension dating back decades. Tuesday morning, San Francisco Mayor London Breed, Police Chief Bill Scott and District Attorney Chesa Boudin denounced the recent rise in violent crimes in the city, particularly the fatal assaults on Ratanapakdee and 76-year-old private investigator Jack Palladino. She heard him say severe trauma. The officer said she would have to call the hospital to find out more. I want him to be close to me, she said. The day after Monthanus and Erics first TV appearance, San Franciscos district attorney charged Antoine Watson, the 19-year-old accused of shoving Vicha to death, with murder and elder abuse. His brothers and sisters are there, Ms. Monthanus said. As she replayed the footage again and again, Monthanus kept coming back to the same conclusion. On Twitter and elsewhere, Asian Americans lit up their feeds with an outpouring of grief and rage. A former public defender, Boudin was part of a new wave of progressive prosecutors who entered office the year before with the promise of reform. The group filed out to the edge of the deck. Two days after entering the hospital, just before dawn, Vicha died in his sleep. After several weeks, the advocate replied that the office didnt have the budget to hire a translator. The incident was caught on camera, galvanizing the national Stop Asian Hate movement. She tried to shield them from the video, but sometimes the evening news would be on and the footage would flash by before she could turn it off. . I killed Dad.. Sie knnen Ihre Einstellungen jederzeit ndern, indem Sie auf unseren Websites und Apps auf den Link Datenschutz-Dashboard klicken. The family of the 84-year-old San Francisco man killed in a seemingly random attack believes it was a racist act. Otherwise youre going to have that forever. The alleged killer is Daly City resident Antoine Watson, who was 19 at the time of the seemingly unprovoked sidewalk attack in the Anza Vista neighborhood. Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting. Since her fathers death, she and Eric agreed that no one would go out at night without him. In Thailand, the killing was front-page news and described as barbaric, a life cut short in a family where siblings typically live into their late 90s, relatives say. }); Where did the assault happen? Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. / CBS San Francisco. Im fine, even if hes in a wheelchair or doesnt wake up, she said. In each case, the suspects were Black. In San Francisco, where 36 percent of the population is of Asian descent, 16 percent of crime victims of known ethnicity were Asian, a similar situation to Alameda County. Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting. 84-year-old San Francisco resident Vicha Ratanapakdee was the target of the brazen and unprovoked daytime attack last Thursday morning. CONTACTS:. Monthanus was alone in the room with her sister on FaceTime. But maybe were going to be hurt forever anyway.. . pg.acq.push(function() { Often, the natural human response is to want someone to blame for the pain that youre experiencing. He added, Although our system is pretty effective at processing cases and punishing, were not effective at providing the kinds of answers to families in pain and need to feel a sense of closure, or to be able to move on with their lives after suffering often unthinkable harm., Most states 48, as well as the District of Columbia have laws addressing hate crimes that are motivated by a victims race, religion or sexual orientation, among other classifications. In the absence of any sense of resolution, the couple began searching for clues on their own. During the pandemic, she persuaded him to avoid shopping and stick to outdoor walks. People are grieving. Before his third heart operation, Vicha debated whether to go through with the procedure; he wasnt sure if he would make it. In each instance, the bystanders appeared to do nothing. But Mr. Chan says he has tallied more than two dozen assaults against Asian-American victims in Chinatown, including two other people shoved by the assailant who knocked down Mr. Diaz.
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