Imagine a black couple, minding their own business on a public street, suddenly set upon by four white, alcohol-fueled, women in their mid-20’s who proceed to viciously assault the black woman at length, all the while shouting profane racist insults. They kick the victim repeatedly in the head and body, pull out some of her hair, and leave her not only bruised and battered but so traumatized that, more than a year after the attack, she suffers from panic attacks and flashbacks, can’t keep her job, and is still undergoing counseling.
A clearcut incident of racist violence, right? An open-and-shut case in court, particularly if the entire attack was caught on video. But now imagine that the judge in this case lets the four perpetrators off the hook with only suspended sentences. His reasoning? He buys their attorney’s defense that they weren’t accustomed to alcohol, since they are Christian fundamentalists strictly forbidden to drink. He also accepts the outrageous argument that they may have felt thatthey were the victims of unreasonable force from their target’s partner, who tried to defend her from the attack.
An impossible scenario, you say? There is no way the attackers would not be charged with a hate crime and given jail time. There is no way a judge would excuse drunken, violent offenders simply because their Christian beliefs made them unused to drunkenness, nor would he consider the victims’ self-defense a mitigating factor in the attackers’ motivation.
And yet such an unthinkable miscarriage of justice actually happened in London, England. To understand how it could be possible, all you need do is change up some key details in the above scenario – the attackers were black Somali Muslims, and the victims white.
Ambaro and Hibo Maxamed, both 24, their sister Ayan, 28, and cousin Ifrah Nur, 28, attacked 22-year-old Rhea Page, who helps care for people with autism and learning difficulties, as she walked to a taxi with her boyfriend Lewis Moore, 23, after a night out. As Moore struck back, they yelled “kill the white slag” [slut] while kicking her as she lay on the ground. It was all captured on CCTV video here.
“We were just minding our own business,” Page said, Read the rest on:
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