People are grieving. window.adsContainer = {"positionAfterTitle":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle5_Rel_Newrev","isOrganicUserAd":true,"max_width":336,"max_height":280},"position2":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_After_Title_Rel_Newrev","max_width":336,"max_height":280},"position3":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Below_Next_Rel_Newrev","max_width":300,"max_height":250},"position4":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle_Rel_Newrev","max_width":300,"max_height":250},"position5":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle1_Rel_Newrev","max_width":300,"max_height":250},"position6":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle2_Rel_Newrev","max_width":336,"max_height":280},"position7":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle3_Rel_Newrev","max_width":300,"max_height":250},"position8":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle4_Rel_Newrev","max_width":300,"max_height":250},"position9":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle5_Rel_Newrev","max_width":336,"max_height":280},"position10":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle6_Rel_Newrev","max_width":336,"max_height":280},"position11":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle7_Rel_Newrev","max_width":336,"max_height":280},"position12":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle8_Rel_Newrev","max_width":336,"max_height":280},"position13":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle9_Rel_Newrev","max_width":336,"max_height":280},"position14":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle10_Rel_Newrev","max_width":336,"max_height":280},"position15":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle11_Rel_Newrev","max_width":336,"max_height":280},"position16":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_Middle12_Rel_Newrev","max_width":336,"max_height":280},"positionTop":{"code":"Article_Desktop_970x250_Header_Rel","isOrganicUserAd":false,"max_width":970,"max_height":250},"positionBottom":{"code":"Article_Desktop_Sidebar_Bottom_Rel_Newrev","isOrganicUserAd":true,"max_width":300,"max_height":600},"positionBottomRight":{"code":"Article_Desktop_300x250_After_Title_Rel_Newrev","isOrganicUserAd":true,"max_width":336,"max_height":280}} These laws can add time to an underlying sentence; in California, they can extend a sentence by three years. In the hours before the attack, Mr. Watson had a string of setbacks. My wife and I thought, Could it be? Jeung recalled. eventAction: 'view' At Watsons bail hearing, Nawabi said he recognized the racial overtones of the case, but added, This false narrative that this is a targeted attack on the Asian community or an elderly man is misleading and prejudicial. He asked the court to order a neuropsychological evaluation and proposed releasing Watson to home confinement, where his family could look after him, along with requiring therapy and counseling, so that Watson wouldnt become another statistic in the criminal-justice world.. 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. Market data provided by Factset. Asian Americans in San Francisco are leading the campaign to recall the city's far-left District Attorney Chesa Boudin on June 7. . Several young people carried signs with an illustration of a 75-year-old Chinese woman who, a few weeks earlier, was punched by a white man and then fought back by whacking him with a wooden board. Monthanus ran to her fathers side and held his hand. Ratanapakdeewas walking in the city's Anza Vista neighborhood on the morning of Jan.28 when he was violently shoved to the ground in whatBoudinreferred to as "a horrific, senseless attack". Or am I just sensitive? She added thatRatanapakdee's family was "horrified" when she relayed the information. Wenn Sie Ihre Auswahl anpassen mchten, klicken Sie auf Datenschutzeinstellungen verwalten. hitType: 'event', After Vicha died, Eric says, he saw so many videos, video after video of attacks in the news. Its nonstop, you know? She thought about the people she had met at the rallies who had quit their jobs to patrol or speak out full time. Mr. Vichas second shot was scheduled for Feb. 12, an appointment he would not live to make. We were like, Is this a hate crime? He was like, I cant talk about this, Eric says. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. 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. By William McCurry. He was also on a waiting list to become a registered gun owner. As two bailiffs escorted Antoine out, the young man in the back left the courtroom and returned with a baby in his arms. Most of the victims were Asian.. The amulet, a precious family heirloom, will be passed to the next generation, Ms. Monthanus said. Anyone who thinks San Francisco is an easy touch, you need to think twice." . 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. But what brought her out to the rallies, more than anything, was her desire for someone to answer for the loss of her father. Sliman Nawabi, a deputy public defender representing Watson, disputed the perception that the attack was racially motivated. 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. KGO obtained surveillance footage which apparently shows Antoine Watson, 19, knocking down Vicha Ratanapakdee, 84, in front of his San Francisco home.Officers reportedly discovered Ratanapakdee on a sidewalk and rendered aid before paramedics rushed him to the hospital . His 20-year-old accomplice who was in the car at the time was also arrested. In March, a man waving a Laotian flag told a small crowd at a protest in San Mateo, Calif., that Vicha reminded him of his grandparents, who collected cans to get by, which was why he decided to go on the front lines and patrol Chinatown in Oakland. "These violent assaults have a devastating impact on our community as they are part of an alarming rise in anti-Asian American hate during the COVID-19 pandemic," Stop AAPI Hate co foundersManjusha Kulkarni and Cynthia Choi said in a joint statement. Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. The man had accepted a plea agreement for domestic-violence charges, and afterward his victim asked the judge if she could say a few words. Watson, along with his accomplice in the killing, pled "not guilty" at their court hearings. }); He died of a brain hemorrhage in a San Francisco hospital two days later. Then, in a jacket, jeans and a white baseball cap, he slipped out of the apartment, down two flights of stairs and into the foggy morning. [1] [2] [3] The assault was captured on a CCTV camera . Breed spoke of the shock she felt seeing the brutal assault of Ratanapakdee on video and offered her sympathies to the family. 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. 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. Otherwise youre going to have that forever. Two days after entering the hospital, just before dawn, Vicha died in his sleep. Watson has reportedlypleaded not guilty to the incident but his lawyer admits that his client had an "outburst of rage. She wasnt sure if Troy even knew what was happening. SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) -- The suspect in the brutal assault that fatally injured an 84-year-old San Francisco resident last week entered a not guilty plea to a homicide charge during a court appearance Wednesday. A few days later, Eric asked me if I saw the news about the recent attack on Carl Chan, the head of Oaklands Chinatown Chamber of Commerce, who has been a vocal supporter of increasing foot patrols and camera surveillance in the neighborhood. The attack came with such a speed that Ratanapakdee was thrown backward and he landed on the pavement. 2023 FOX News Network, LLC. He gets talked about as though he's some little baby minor. At the time of the attack, Mr. Vicha was only months away from being able to return to Thailand. stay inside. And these memories, the sense of injustice that still lingered in them, overlapped with other histories still. I told him to walk that way. Mr. Nawabi described Mr. Watson as someone who had struggled with anger. Around midnight, after Eric and the boys went to bed, the two women drove to the corner with a bucket, gloves and a dish brush. All rights reserved. Owners of gun stores reported more Asian customers than ever before. A judge in San Francisco ruled Friday that Antoine Watson will stand trial in the brutal death of 84-year-old Vicha Ratanapakdee. Through her organization, Hollins, who lost two brothers to homicide in the last decade, assists victims of crime and lobbies to increase support services provided by the state. SAN FRANCISCOAntoine Watson, 19, who was arrested on January 30 for the deadly assault on an elderly man, 84-year-old Vicha Ratanapakdee, was held without bail after a court hearing on Monday, February 8. An 84-year-old man was killed after he was brutally attacked on a San Francisco street. Yet today I still face people from the Black community who will come into our office on a weekly basis, saying that we only care about our people, that we just take their resources. Antoine Watson, a 19-year-old resident of Daly City, made his first court appearance at the Hall of Justice after being taken into custody . Antoine Watson, with murder and 20-year-old female friend, Maylasia Goo . Watson is accused in the deadly attack of Vicha Ratanapakdee in the city's Anza Vista neighborhood on January 28. First published on February 4, 2021 / 6:00 AM. The San Francisco District Attorney's office told KPIX 5 on Monday that their detention motion to hold 19-year-old Antoine Watson without bail was granted by the court. Then, on March 16, a white gunman in the Atlanta area drove to several businesses and shot eight people to death. Watson, the court documents state, had been cited for "reckless driving, speeding and failure to stop at a stop sign" in the hours before the attack. The whole family is in deep agony, Jennifer Steiner, a longtime friend whom Antoines mother chose to speak on her behalf, told me. The family of the 84-year-old San Francisco man killed in a seemingly random attack believes it was a racist act. window.googletag.pubads().addEventListener('impressionViewable', function(event) { 19-year-old Antoine Watson, pushing . That week, on Feb. 4, the couple spoke with San Franciscos district attorney, Chesa Boudin, on a call. Police pulled over and handcuffed Antoine Watson hours before he allegedly killed an 84-year-old Thai man in San Francisco's Anza Vista neighborhood last year, according to a timeline that . But, we can't solve a problem without knowing how big it is,"San Francisco assemblymember and chair of the state's budget committee,Phil Ting, said in a statement. Around 10 p.m., a new search result popped up. These conversations surfaced the memory of Black Americans killed senselessly by Asian perpetrators, too Latasha Harlins, the young teenager carrying $2 and a bottle of orange juice, shot to death by a Korean American shopkeeper in 1991; Akai Gurley, an unarmed young father shot to death in a dark stairwell by a Chinese American police officer in 2014. Intravenous lines and electrode patches linked his body to a constellation of machines and bags of fluid. Im not a judge. eventCategory: event.slot.getSlotElementId(), Im just a human being who feels things., He pondered this while sitting in his car, in the spot where Antoine reportedly parked on the morning of the attack on Vicha. 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. a white gunman killed eight people at a FedEx facility in Indianapolis. Stories like Vichas inspired some to start neighborhood-patrol groups to accompany elders on their walks to and from home, scan the streets for suspicious activity and, in some cases, call the police to intervene. Some assailants have yelled slurs while throwing a punch or slashing at their victims with a knife. Monthanus wailed softly. She found it hard to follow the legal vocabulary and felt bad asking Eric to explain terms and intricacies. Shes lost her child.. 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. The killing of Vicha was so plain as day, said Will Lex Ham, a New York-based actor, who after watching the video flew from New York to San Francisco to help lead protests and safety patrols in Asian neighborhoods. Eric, who grew up near San Jose, described himself as someone who never thought much about race during his upbringing. Video footage shows the teen running at Ratanapakdee and pushing him over, knocking him to the ground. In another week, her sons would go back to school, and Monthanus, a food-safety inspector for the city school district, would be back at work. Monthanus was too emotional then. The hearing was brief and procedural; a trial date has yet to be set. According to Sliman Nawabi, the public defender, Antoine feels remorse and shame for what happened and wishes he could sit down with Vichas family so he could explain the struggles he has gone through in life. In the appeal, the family asked residents in San Francisco to contact the local district attorney Chesa Boudin to ensure that Antoine Watson and Ms Maylasia Goo, a 19-year-old woman charged as an accessory to the crime, face the full force of the law for what they describe as a racially motivated hate crime. His wife suggested that he have some coffee first; he told her he wouldnt be gone for long, whispering so as not to wake the kids. They will all be together.. Vicha and his first grandson, Titus Lawson, in 2009. hitType: 'event', He graduated from Ithaca College with a Bachelors of Science in Television-Radio. Antoine grew up in San Francisco and spent part of his childhood with his siblings, parents and grandparents in the Anza Vista area, where Vicha later lived. I want him to be close to me, she said. The grandmother of a teen who senselessly pushed and killed a Thai grandfather has said her grandson should walk free. window.googletag.pubads().addEventListener('slotRenderEnded', function(event) { New images have continued to surface on a weekly, sometimes daily, basis. Solidarity is what it should be, she says. Antoine Watson, a 19-year-old resident of neighboring Daly City, was arrested two days after the attack and charged with . She thought about Antoine, knowing there were people in his life who loved him. Throughout 2020, multiple strangers had come at her seemingly out of nowhere. Monthanus and Eric had been busy arranging her fathers funeral while fielding phone calls and messages from family, friends and strangers. In November, another old man spat in her direction as her sons rode their scooters by the bay. She wanted to keep him alive. He told me that Watson lost his job and support structure during the pandemic; in addition to attending college classes and working at FedEx, he had previously gone to therapy and taken medication. 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. From the front row, Monthanus fixed her gaze on him as he walked slowly to a seat near the gallery. This is in part because the defendant already faces a long prison sentence, and also because, as one prosecutor put it, its impossible to know whats in someones heart. The Bureau of Justice Statistics reported in June that federal prosecutors declined to pursue hate-crimes charges in about four out of every five cases from 2005 to 2019, citing insufficient evidence.. Monthanus didnt always agree with her father, but she loved his spirit. But once he does, we should work out some kind of situation where we could forgive somehow and move on with our life. Legal Statement. I killed Dad.. The suspect, Antoine Watson, was arrested and charged with murder and is pending trial. San Francisco (BCN) . We are one of the worlds fastest growing ga('ads.send', { Where did the assault happen? Anyone can read what you share. His brother, Surachai Ratanapakdee, 89, now the only surviving sibling of eight children, remembered Mr. Vicha as studious and curious about the world outside the rice paddies, watermelon fields and orchards of the family farm. Antoine Watson, 19, . In March, Jeung says, Stop AAPI Hate received roughly 2,800 reports, about the same number he received in all of 2020. The submissions came from 31 states and the District of Columbia, with nearly half the reports originating in California and New York. Her father had been assaulted and taken to a hospital, a police officer said. Public safety is a lot bigger than the ability to arrest or prosecute someone, says Tinisch Hollins, who runs the advocacy group Californians for Safety and Justice. In the weeks since it happened, Mr. Vichas death has become a symbol for the vulnerability that many in the Asian-American community feel in this moment. Today she had prepared a speech and printed a few copies to distribute to reporters. Before sitting down, he glanced toward the back of the room and smiled when he recognized a young man. A petite 84-year-old with soft white hair, Vicha Ratanapakdee was a lifelong Buddhist, the kind of person who embraced the world with open arms. . It was then that Mr. Vicha walked up Anzavista Avenue, a street with views of skyscrapers in the citys financial district. By OLGA R. RODRIGUEZ February 2, 2021. The question is: Does it prevent things like this from happening again? She continued: Regardless of the laws intent, how its received is, This is disingenuous, because were using the same tools to fix the problem. The suspect was booked on suspicion of murder, elder abuse, and assault with a deadly weapon, KTVU reported. She worried how the exposure affected her sons. A witness told the police they heard a voice shouting, Why you lookin at me? twice before hearing Ratanapakdee, prosecutors said. Otherwise, her mother believed, Vichas soul couldnt leave the earth and start its journey toward the afterlife. }); 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. Watson, the suspect identified in Ratanapakdee's murder,wasarrested and chargedwith murder and elder abuse. 2021, 19-year-old Antoine Watson, was just "having some sort of temper tantrum" when he killed him. Last year Ms. Monthanus, Mr. Vichas daughter, was twice accosted on the street by people who told her to leave the country because, the attackers said, Asians had caused the coronavirus. Watson can be seen running up to Ratanapakdee and violently shoving him in video from SF CBS Local near the corner of Fortuna and Anza Vista. 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. eventCategory: event.slot.getSlotElementId(), When Wan first set up her branch there, the Bayview was in the midst of a drastic demographic shift that was occurring throughout the region, marked by an influx of Asians and an exodus of Black residents. eventCategory: event.slot.getSlotElementId(), It was the first court appearance of 19-year-old Daly City resident Antoine Watson since he was arrested for the assault this past weekend. It was heartbreaking. The suspects have been identified as Antoine Watson, 19, and Maylasia Goo, 20, both of . One witness at the scene told officers that he saw . Others have injured or killed people without saying a word. Monthanus and Eric posed for photos and signed a petition to recall Chesa Boudin, as people stopped to greet them with elbow bumps and condolences. Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by Refinitiv Lipper. Watson was apparently vandalizing a car when Ratanapakdee looked at him and changed directions on his walk, Connolly said in his detention motion, citing surveillance footage from the scene. Their desire to make sense of Vichas death, to understand what motivated it, placed them in the center of a conversation so much broader than their own. Watson allegedly carried out the deadly attack on senior citizen Vicha Ratanapakdee in the city's Anza Vista neighborhood on January 28, 2021. 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. They sailed toward the Golden Gate Bridge, the choppy waters jostling them as they chanted the Five Precepts. }) How could it have been prevented? She wakes up crying; she goes to sleep crying, Steiner said. Grandpa died as a result of Antoine not being arrested for reckless driving, he said, and then not having proper services to come out and talk to him while hes out here yelling all morning., He thought about Antoines family and something his friend once told him, about how when his son had issues with another family, he would meet with them to talk about it. On that morning a number of security cameras in the area captured Mr. Watson banging a car with his hand, according to Mr. Boudin, the district attorney. She lowered her head and opened her palms to touch the rug three times. A photograph of Vicha Ratanapakdee that hangs in his daughters home. San Francisco Mayor London Breed, joined by several other elected officials including City Attorney David Chiu, State Senator Scott Wiener, and Supervisors Catherine Stefani and Rafael Mandelman, led the crowd in marching and chanting slogans. "Racism has once again proven deadly" An elderly Thai man was knocked down and killed by a teenager in San Francisco. For the past two years, Monthanus had started taking care of her parents more intensely, after her mother was diagnosed with dementia and her father with three clogged arteries. For his grieving family, the reckoning hasnt gone far enough. In the . $300,000 a year is roughly what a family of four needs to earn to live a middle-class lifestyle in the Bay Area. she trailed off and let out a deep sigh. Antoine Watson previously pleaded not guilty to murder and elder abuse charges for the daylight attack on Anza . https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/17/magazine/vicha-ratanapakdee.html. Monthanus and her parents subscribed to a Buddhist belief that, after death, the soul takes 100 days to reach the afterlife. 2023 FOX News Network, LLC. That same month, at a protest for Angelo Quinto a Filipino American Navy veteran killed by police officers in Antioch, Calif., in December 2020 a young woman from Hawaii broke into tears while remembering the story of her Filipino-Japanese family, migrants who worked the pineapple and sugar-cane plantations, and the night the cops detained her father, who struggled with addiction, during a mental-health crisis. hitType: 'event', Allen Martin reports on the first court appearance by the 19-year-old suspect who fatally assaulted an 84-year-old San Francisco man last week (2-3-2021) A witness told police officers that Mr. Watson said something to the effect of What are you looking at? A security camera located inside a neighbors apartment captured Mr. Watson charging across the pavement toward Mr. Vicha, who briefly turned to his assailant before the impact. 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. According to the San Francisco District Attorney's office, Watson had been observed and contacted by San Francisco Police officers earlier that morning for traffic infractions resulting in a minor collision and was issued a citation. MonthanusRatanapakdee with her husband, Eric Lawson. She debated whether to show it to her mother, who had become more fragile after a recent stroke. Boudin says Antoine Watson was . San Francisco police arrested a 19-year-old man on suspicion of murder following a recent attack on an 84-year-old man in the Anza Vista neighborhood. Monthanus agreed, even as her worry turned to panic. That he still had a life ahead of him. Let it go. hitType: 'event', She never got to decide. Legal Statement. ", When asked outside the courtroom what she wanted to see happen, Watson's grandmother said, "To see him walk out this door like I'm walking out right now.". We said, Dad, we are going to go back soon! Ms. Monthanus recalled. Give him a chance, she could hear her father saying. The nurse who picked up, however, only had more questions. Two days after the attack, Ms. Monthanus and her mother went to the spot where Mr. Vicha was killed and saw that his blood still stained the pavement. His death helped awaken the nation to a rise in anti-Asian violence.