Thread: Woman Charged With Hate Crime in Scarf-Pulling Incident

November 19, 2009
7:20:21 P.M.

Woman charged with hate crime in scarf-pulling incident

November 18, 2009 8:10 PM | 77 Comments | UPDATED STORY

A suburban Chicago woman has been charged with a hate crime for allegedly yanking the head scarf of a Muslim woman in Tinley Park two days after the shootings at Fort Hood, Texas.

Valerie Kenney, 54, a bank teller from Tinley Park, appeared at the Bridgeview Courthouse today and was released on $5,000 bail. If convicted of the felony, Kenney faces up to 3 years in prison and a $25,000 fine. She is due back in court Dec. 3.

"I think (a charge of hate crime) sends the appropriate message that these kinds of race-based lash-outs are unacceptable," said Ahmed Rehab, executive director of the Chicago chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. "Every time something like (the Fort Hood shootings) happens, the Muslim community prepares for a backlash."

Amal Abusumayah, 28, told police she was shopping at a Tinley Park grocery store Nov. 7 when a middle-age woman passed her in the aisle and made a loud reference to the killings at Fort Hood.

"She said, 'The man that did that shooting in Texas was from the Middle East,' in a really loud and angry voice," Abusumayah told the Tribune last week. Minutes later, while Abusumayah was paying for her groceries at a self-checkout, the woman approached her from behind and tugged hard on her blue and beige head scarf, she said.

"I turned around and looked at her, and she walked out of the store," she said. "My scarf didn't come off because it was on very tight, but my head was tugged back."

Abusumayah, who was born in the United States and raised in Berwyn by Palestinian immigrants, followed the woman into the lot and called police, who arrested Kenney within minutes.

Kenney declined to comment after the court appearance.

Reached at home Wednesday, Abusumayah also declined to comment, saying she did not want to provoke "a backlash."

She said last week that the Nov. 5 shootings at Fort Hood, where 13 soldiers were killed, were "very upsetting and very sad to me -- as Muslims and Arabs we do not tolerate these kinds of actions."

The scarf incident was the first of two apparent race-related attacks in Tinley Park in the wake of the Fort Hood shootings, Police Chief Michael O'Connell said. On Nov. 8, a Muslim family found racist graffiti on the front of their home, O'Connell said. The person rang the family's doorbell but ran off, O'Connell said.

He said hate crimes such as the one Kenney is charged with "attack the dignity of people because of their religious beliefs, race or sexual orientation, and we don't tolerate that here."

--Kim Janssen and Joel Hood

http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2009 ... uslim.html

That hate crime bull as well as PC only works one way!

Reached at home Wednesday, Abusumayah also declined to comment, saying she did not want to provoke "a backlash

Oh here we go again!

I think (a charge of hate crime) sends the appropriate message that these kinds of race-based lash-outs are unacceptable," said Ahmed Rehab

This isnt a "hate crime". Maybe a simple assault but not a hate crime. And what does "race" have to do with Islam?

I agree "butterbean" I had to leave my message on there as well. Do people no longer,know any other phrase then the word "racist"? It is a simple assault. Some folks on there sounded as though they wanted to punish her more then some hardened criminal. That is why I injected the word muzzies in my comment. Maybe they are muzzies on there.

Doesn't the Muslim woman have a choice as to whether press charges? It is really up to her, not some politically motivated police officer or DA or an ethnic lobbyist lawyer.

The thing I hate most about the hate crimes bill is that it is anti white, unless you are gay. A crime is a crime, no matter what the motive. You shouldn't get a stiffer sentence just because they think hate is involved. I think you have to have hate of some kind to committ serious crimes. When a rapist rapes or rapes and kills a person, part of that might be hatred for women OF ANY COLOR. A Catholic priest once told me that there are degrees of sin. But i think that stealing is stealing, no matter the amount. Murder is murder, no matter what the excuse. Assault is assault no matter what the excuse or who the assault is on. This hate bill is just for show. I hate what my country has become.