One of the most problematic issues that affect the Asian American community is the issue of hate crimes, or more notably: racially motivated physical violence and sexual assaults directed against Asian Americans.

Whether someone believes that crimes should be punished according to race by the justice system is another debate altogether. However, there is no doubt that racially motivated crimes against Asian Americans exist.

The most notable example is that the case of Vincent Chin which galvanized the Asian American community into actively speaking out on and educate the public on crimes directed against Asian Americans that are racially motivated. For the Vincent Chin example, the perpetrators stated to Vincent Chin that "It's because of you little motherfuckers that we're out of work." This statement was due to the perception by Ebens and Nitz that they lost their manufacturing jobs at a Detroit automobile plant due to downsizing caused by competition from Japanese automakers in the 1980s. Vincent Chin was brutally murdered by Ebens and Nitz due to the perception that as a Chinese American US citizen, Chin was equivalent to a Japanese foreign national for Ebens and Nitz to vent their frustrations out on.

Vincent Chin's case is interesting in that it was caused by the perception of Asian Americans being the perpetual foreigner stereotype ; that somehow Asian Americans are never equal citizens to white Americans of European descent.

This has been a continual problem for Asian Americans since the earliest Asian immigrants to the USA. Various sorts of crimes ranging from discrimination to murderous lynchings have been perpetuated against Asian Americans or Asian immigrants since the earliest Chinese gold miner days.

Racially motivated violence were directed against the Chinese coolies, or later the Japanese migrant farm workers in Hawaii, or Filipino workers in the American "deep south." In most cases, it was caused by fear of the perception of the yellow peril taking away American jobs from white Americans.

Thus, violence was justified by perpetrators against Asian Americans or Asian immigrants because of their "otherness" as as perpetual foreigners who were somehow inferior or sub-human in the minds of these criminals.

The same sorts of mentality exist to this day where Asian Americans like Chinese food delivery people are frequently robbed or killed in places like New York City and other places. Mostly Chinese American teenage boys or Chinese immigrant males, these restaurant deliverymen were brutally beaten to death with baseball bats or metal pipes — similar to how Vincent Chin was beaten to death, or shot with handguns that the criminals thought it would be fun to kill these perpetual foreigners who in their minds were not "real" Americans or human beings like they were.

More notable recent examples include Chai Vang? and Cha Vang? in Wisconsin. There is little doubt that both cases were racially motivated in nature whether be it either Vang was the perpetrator or victim of racially motivated hate crimes.

While lynchings, beatings and shootings are more directed against Asian males in the USA. Sexually related crimes are more targeted towards Asian American women.

The notable case of Michael Lohman is explained in the database here. But suffice to say, that rapes and verbal harassment against Asian American women are common. And in some extreme cases, like that of Lili Wang, Asian women are also victims of murders based on racial stereotypes and prejudices stemmed from sexual fetishes.



Hate crimes against Asian Americans date from the earliest years of the Asian American experience and continue to the present day. From lynchings of Chinese coolies to the ongoing cases of Chinese food delivery murders to Hmong deer hunters and sexual assaults against Asian American women, crimes directed against Asian Americans are not as widely publicized in the mainstream media.

Because of the model minority stereotype, hate crimes against Asian Americans are not as widely publicized or acknowledged in the mainstream medias or by non-academics versed in the issues surrounding the Asian American experience. The main reason has to do with using this model minority stereotype to scapegoat and silence Asian Americans and other ethnicities to think that crimes against Asian Americans doesn't exist.

For example, during the LA riots in 1992 lots of Korean American and Korean immigrant store owners were the targets of racially targeted shootings and robberies. While much animosity still exists between Korean Americans and African Americans over these crimes, there is little doubt that African American robbers see these Korean American store owners as part of the model minority stereotype and are easy targets and victims. The problem is due to these criminals seeing these Koreans buying up property in "their neighborhoods" and "making money off the African Americans while not giving anything back to the community" — and most likely sending that money to South Korea as the perpetual foreigners are wont to do, according to the stereotype and misconception. That mistaken belief compounded with the model minority stereotype of these Koreans not having any financial problems breeds jealousy and contempt for many of these African American teenagers who are in poverty.

Thus, with the dearth of media coverage and general knowledge regarding the plight of Asian Americans as also victims of hate crimes, Asian Americans are even more prone to racial violence. And the most contemptuous aspect of hate crimes against Asian Americans is the denial and ignorance that such problems exist. Thus, the following is a list of real hate crimes of the victims and criminals involved.

While theoretically Asian Americans can be equally capable of being criminals as well as victims, for the purposes of this wiki and as far a realistic consideration goes, the vast majority of Asian Americans are victims of hate crimes rather than the perpetrators.

And while recent documented cases of hate crimes against Asian Americans exist and referenced, keep in mind that many of the victims and criminals in early American history are often neglected and omitted from the history textbooks. So, there is no way to know which Chinese coolie was the victim of a lynching. Therefore, it is imperative that this kind of information is known and acknowledged by the general public and especially Asian Americans ourselves.

Victims

Rock Springs Massacre, Wyoming, September 2, 1885

Issaquah Riot of 1885, Washington, September 5, 1885

Chinese Massacre Cove, Oregon, May 25, 1887

Fermin Tobera, January 22, 1930

Vincent Chin, June 19, 1982

Thong H. Huynh, May 4, 1983

An Pech July 22, 1983

Ly Yung Cheung February 29, 1984

Navroze Mody, September 27, 1987

Raphanor Or, Ram Chun, Sokhim An, Thuy Tran and Oeun Lim, January 17, 1989

Ming Hai "Jim" Loo, July 28, 1989

Heng Lim, June 16, 1990

Hung Truong, August 9, 1990

Nakashima Family, August 13, 1992

Luyen Phan Nguyen, August 15, 1992

Sam Nhang Nhem, August 14, 1993

Thanh Mai, June 18, 1995

Eddy Wu, November 8, 1995

Thien Minh Ly, January 29, 1996

Kwan Chung Kao, April 29, 1997

Kanu Patel and Mukesh Patek, October 15, 1998

Naoki Kamijima, April 5, 1999

Won-Joon Yoon, July 4, 1999

Joseph Ileto, August 10, 1999

Sandip Patel, Theo Pham, Ji-ye Sun, Anil Thakur, April 28, 2000

Jin Sheng Liu, September 7, 2000
Thung Phetakoune, July 14, 2001

Kenny Chiu, July 21, 2001

Balbir Singh Sodhi, September 15, 2001

Waqar Hasan September 15, 2001

Mijanaur Rahman and Mohammed Sakawat, August 2002

Vasudev Patel, October 4, 2002

Lili Wang October 12, 2002

Jian Lin Chun, October 18, 2002

Anthony Buco David II, July 7, 2003

Huang Chen, February 13, 2004

Bang Mai, July 11, 2004

Vang Family Arson December 20, 2004

Charlotte Colton, Ze Fairchild, Maleka Higgins, Nicola Grant, Guadalupe Swartz, Dexter Shannon, Beverly Graham, January 30, 2006

Sovintha Nhem and Sophea Sun, July 2006

Alia Ansari, October 19, 2006

Robert Stanford, Song Sun Lee and Kam Yan Li, October 21, 2006

Cha Vang, January 5, 2007

Satendar Singh, July 1, 2007

Kwok Wai Ho, July 10, 2007

Hong Zhi Wang, November 2007

Minghui Yu, April 4, 2008

Houston-Dallas Bus Crash, August 8, 2008

Sacramento Bus Crash, October 6, 2008

David Kao, June 13, 2009

Yuxoing Han, August 3, 2009

Glenn Hanamoto, October 25, 2009

Huan Chen, January 24, 2010

Tiangshen Yu, April 16, 2010

Yu Yao, May 16, 2010

Jinghong Kang, July 18, 2010

Cristorey Mariano, July 23, 2010

Tacoma riot of 1885, October 1885

Watsonville Riots of 1929, 1929

Thanh Lam, April 8, 1988

Sophy Soeung and Sam Nhang Nhem, August 14, 1993

Tuong Phan, May 1994

Sylvia Kim, 1997

Rishi Maharaj, October 1998

Jacob George Mathew and Mary George Mathew, September 24, 2001

Loay Elbasyouni, September 28, 2001

Sachin Nagane, September 29, 2001

Swaran Kaur Bhullar, September 30, 2001

John Park, October 2001

Ippei Inoue, October 5, 2001

Ranbir Singh, October 12, 2001

Karnail Kail Singh, October 19, 2001

Surinder Singh Sidhu, December 2001

Aris Gadduang, March 9, 2002

Siukwo Cheng, December 2002

Jeffrey Woo, June 6, 2003

Paul Wong Jr., June 6, 2003

Rajinder Singh Khalsa, July 12, 2004

San Francisco assaults, June 6, 2004

Chen Tsu, 2005

Joseph Park and Janet Oh, April 25, 2005

Rajnikant Parikh, July 4, 2006

Iqbal Singh, July 30, 2006

John Lu, August 12, 2006

Reynold Liang, August 12, 2006

Avtar Singh, October 11, 2006

Shahid Amber, October 29, 2006

Hai Vo, November 12, 2006

Marie Stefanie Martinez, March 16, 2007

Kuldip Singh Nag, March 30, 2007

18 year old Auburn University student, April, 2007

Vacher Harpal, May 24, 2007

Canal Street, Chinatown, NYC, July 2, 2007

Joe Yoon Kang, May 10, 2009

John Ming Tan, September 10, 2009

Qiu Xiufang, October 26, 2009

South Philadelphia HS Assaults, December 3, 2009

Lower Manhattan Assaults, April 2010




Ger and Chao Lee, 1998

Singh Hushyar, September 11, 2001

Gurcharan & Banso Singh, September 14, 2001

Jagit Gill & Santokh Sing, September 16, 2001

Weixi Li, October 4, 2001


Firebombing of Hindu Temple, St. Louis, MI, February 23 and March 1, 2003

Vijay and Kamal Rastogi – cross burning, August 24, 2003


Asian Pacific American Legal Center receives hate mail, February 9, 2005

Hate mail sent to Asian businesses, Philadelphia, PA, October 2005

Maqbool Ali Kahn, October 2006

Racial slurs spray painted on driveway in New Jersey, June 2007

Racial slurs spray painted on driveway, ethnic intimidation in Saline, Michigan, June 15, 2007

"Anti Asians Anonymous" Facebook website, June 2007

Perpetrators

Ronald Ebens & Michael Nitz, June 19, 1982

Mark Wahlberg, April 8, 1988

Christopher Dabbs, 1987

Norcal Rapist, 1991-present

Mark Cleaver, 1992

Andrew J. Franz and Augustine LaBarge, 1998

Benjamin Free, 1998

Miguel J.
Rodela, Tomas Vanlannen and Casey Lynn Tegelman, 1998

Benjamin Smith, July 4, 1999

Buford O. Furrow, August 10, 1999

Richard Baumhammers, April 2000

Mark Anthony Lewis, 2000

Kenneth Earl Newell, 2001

John Dale McWilliams 2001

Richard Labbe, July 14, 2001

Christopher Hearn, July 21, 2001

Andrew E. Savage, September 11, 2001

James Herrick, September 13, 2001

Frank Silva Roque, September 15, 2001

Mark Anthony Stroman September 15, 2001

Shari Margaret Mitchell, September 16, 2001

Travis Lynn Kitts & Jason Brandon Kitts, September 24, 2001

Steven Falkowski, October 12, 2001

John Cullinan, John McCarthy, and Tammy Perry 2002

Jason Fulkerson, 2002

Michael Lohman, 2002-2005

Nathaniel Conner & Paul Laird, February 23 and March 1, 2003

Salvatore Maceli, July 12, 2004

Daniel Streeter, 2005

Stanley C. Jaroszenski, June 13, 2005

Jennifer Sanmarco, January 30, 2006

Paul Heavey and Kevin Brown, August 12, 2006.

Dan Hoyt, September 1, 2006

Joseph Melcher, October 21, 2006

Umair Ahmed, May 24, 2007

Billy Hagberg and Winston McCarty, June 2007

Resources

Anti-Asian Violence & Race Relations Publications & Materials

References