2 Staten Island Men Charged With Election Night Hate Crime

[DeepModem Mom]

Source: New York Times

Two white Staten Island men face hate crimes charges after they were arrested on Friday in the beating of a black teenager on the night that Barack Obama was elected president, the police said on Saturday.

The teenager, Alie Kamara, 17, was walking home on Pine Place in the Staten Island neighborhood of Stapleton when several men hit him on the head with a baseball bat and yelled “Obama,” said Aliya Latif, the civil rights director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, who was in contact with Alie’s family since the attack and spoke to his mother on Saturday after the arrests were announced.

A law enforcement official said on Saturday that an independent witness had helped them to identify two suspects, both from Staten Island, in the attack. Ralph Nicoletti, 18, of 35 Wadsworth Avenue, and Bryan Garaventa, 18, of 169 Maryland Avenue, were arrested on Friday, the police said.

They face charges of hate-crime assault and criminal possession of a weapon, the police said.

The police said that the teenager was walking home late on Nov. 4 when a black sedan pulled up alongside him. Several white men jumped out, struck him on the head with a blunt object, and then fled in the car, the police said.

Alie was taken to Richmond University Medical Center in stable condition that night where he was treated and released....

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/16/nyregion/16attack.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

[DesertFlower]

1. i hope they are prosecuted to the

full extent of the law.

[BrklynLiberal]

2. Since it was a hate crime, I hope they get maximum sentences..

[uppityperson]

3. k&r for prosecuting hate crimes. Now, to go after hate radio and Palin speech.

[customerserviceguy]

4. I saw that on the local news

and while I should have been shocked to find that sort of behavior around here, I really wasn't. I moved to NY a bit more than a year and a half ago from the Northwest, and in that time, I've heard racial slur words that I had to have defined for me.

[fascisthunter]

5. You Gotta Be Pretty Sick to Do That to Someone Over Politics

I do blame hate rhetoric from GOP political leaders, as well as their handy right wing radio and media.

It's one thing to strongly disagree with us on the left, but to do this???? We have done nothing to these people except for exercising our right to vote. I guess their BIG problem is American Democracy itself.

[liberalmuse]

6. Funny, I haven't seen this all over the news like backwards 'B' girl.

And yet, THIS story turns out to be true. Where's the outrage? I guess Obama supporters don't make up shit.

Poor kid. I hope the perpetrators get the maximum penalty.

[Pavulon]

7. The must be innocent, no racists up north!

this sort of thing only happens in the south...

[defendandprotect]

8. This is who the right-wing really are --- ignorant/violent people --