I was curious about the ethnicity of the attackers. One brother survived OK so he would have known some characteristics of his attackers, if only their size and what they were wearing.
The modus-operandi of using baseball bats in the beating suggested to me that these were white guys.
Especially since the 3rd paragraph mentioned skin color as being the cause for the attack :
Speaking outside the hospital, Diego Sucuzhanay said his brother had been singled out for his “skin color” and sounded a warning to other immigrants. “Today my brother is the victim, but tomorrow it could be your brother, your mother, your father,” Mr. Sucuzhanay said.
They finally get around to describing the attackers way down in the 11th paragraph, just in passing :
One of the men hit Jose over the head with a bottle, and the driver of the car swung an aluminum baseball bat at his head, the police said. He fell to the floor as the three attackers, who were black, continued kicking and punching him, the police said. The beating ended only when Romel held up his cellphone and said he was calling the police.
So what precisely about the victim's skin color caused the attack? That he was lighter than the attackers ?
And if the attackers had indeed been white this would've been prominently mentioned in the headline and then throughout the article starting with the first paragraph.
Can it be a bias attack if blacks attack Latins who they suspected were gay, when there are no 'majority' groups here to pin this on ?
Even though they yelled gay slurs at them as they were beaten and the brother indicated skin color played a part in defining who would be a victim , ' ... the police have described as a possible bias attack ...' . Possible ?
Family Keeps Vigil for Beaten Brooklyn Man
An Ecuadorean immigrant who was brutally beaten in Brooklyn last weekend in what the police have described as a possible bias attack was declared brain-dead on Tuesday, a law enforcement official said. But the man was being kept on life support while his family decides whether to donate his organs, the official said.
There have been no arrests in the attack, which came four weeks after the fatal stabbing of an Ecuadorean immigrant on Long Island by a group of teenagers who had been looking for a Latino to attack. The attacks have jolted nerves in the city’s Latino communities and have drawn wide condemnation from city officials and Ecuadorean community leaders, many of whom joined relatives of the Brooklyn beating victim on Tuesday.
At a press conference outside Elmhurst Hospital Center, where the man, Jose O. Sucuzhanay, was being treated, his brother Diego Sucuzhanay said he was alive but in critical condition. Family members were waiting for Mr. Sucuzhanay’s parents to arrive from Ecuador before making any medical decisions.
Hospital officials refused to comment on the victim’s condition, citing the family’s wishes. The law enforcement official, however, said that a death certificate had been filed.
Speaking outside the hospital, Diego Sucuzhanay said his brother had been singled out for his “skin color” and sounded a warning to other immigrants. “Today my brother is the victim, but tomorrow it could be your brother, your mother, your father,” Mr. Sucuzhanay said.
His brother, the co-owner of a real estate company, had “always worked to contribute something,” he said.
On Tuesday afternoon, a police helicopter hovered over the patch of Bushwick, Brooklyn, where Mr. Sucuzhanay lived and worked with his relatives, operating a family business that friends said was thriving. At the firm, Open Realty International, a flier on the door advertised financial services, including advice on taxes and investing.
“Bring your problems,” the flier said, “and leave without them.”
Early Sunday, less than a mile from where Mr. Sucuzhanay worked, he and his brother Romel were set upon by men the police said they believed were strangers.
The brothers were walking home from a bar, arms around each other, the police said. At the corner of Bushwick Avenue and Kossuth Place, three men riding in what a witness described as a maroon or red sport utility vehicle spied the brothers and shouted anti-gay and anti-Hispanic slurs.
One of the men hit Jose over the head with a bottle, and the driver of the car swung an aluminum baseball bat at his head, the police said. He fell to the floor as the three attackers, who were black, continued kicking and punching him, the police said. The beating ended only when Romel held up his cellphone and said he was calling the police.
On Tuesday, the police released a description of one of the men, saying he is 6 feet tall and thin, and wore a black leather jacket, boots, dark jeans and a dark baseball cap during the attack. The authorities said they did not have the license number of the car. The reward for information was set at $22,000.
Julia Osman, who worked with Mr. Sucuzhanay, visited him at the hospital on Monday. His face was so swollen that she could not see his eyes, and his head was wrapped in bandages. “He was kind, and cared about everyone who worked with him,” she said.
In the decade he has in the United States, Mr. Sucuzhanay rose from waiter to business owner. He got his real estate sales license three years ago, according to state records, and later started two companies and became the owner of several buildings, according to friends and public records.
“He was happy to have his own business,” said Cesar Alvarado, who owns a metal shop in Bushwick. Mr. Sucuzhanay’s office was a tenant of his, Mr. Alvarado said. “It was going well for him.”
Mr. Sucuzhanay, 31, well known in the local community. Herbert Velez, who worked with him to find an affordable apartment, said: “He works with everybody around here. He found a lot of people homes. He does whatever it takes to help someone.”
It was a family business, and the family was large: Mr. Sucuzhanay was one of 12 siblings. Walter R. Sinche, the executive director of the International Ecuadorean Alliance, a cultural organization, went to Open Realty to buy a house. The Sucuzhanays, he said, had a passion for real estate.
“Most of our community is working in the construction businesses,” he said. “Now they’re bosses, and own their own businesses.”
Tony Garcia, the owner of a competing real estate company across the street from Open Realty, said Mr. Sucuzhanay worked for him for about two years. Mr. Sucuzhanay had been hard-working and efficient, Mr. Garcia said. “People trusted him,” he said. “He was aggressive. He was good.”
No comments:
Post a Comment