Antoine Watson, with murder and 20-year-old female friend, Maylasia Goo . I just want to know why he did it. Ms. Monthanus says she and her family will charter a boat under the Golden Gate Bridge and scatter some into the Pacific Ocean. About an hour later, Mr. Vicha, an 84-year-old retired auditor from Thailand, was violently slammed to the ground by a man who charged into him at full speed. SAN FRANCISCO Weary of being cooped inside during the pandemic, Vicha Ratanapakdee was impatient for his regular morning walk. Within one week of the websites start, Stop AAPI Hate received 673 reports of verbal and physical attacks, as well as other forms of harassment, like spitting, coughing and online threats. Police haven't said anything about a possible motive but they have arrested 19-year-old Antoine Watson and charged him with elder abuse, assault with a deadly weapon and murder. Officers arrested Antoine Watson on Saturday after serving a warrant at a Daly City home. In the footage, Ratanapakdee, who was originally from Thailand, can be seen walking in the driveway of a house when the suspect suddenly sprinted towards him and knocked him to the ground before casually walking away in the same direction he came from. Before his third heart operation, Vicha debated whether to go through with the procedure; he wasnt sure if he would make it. But the legal tampering window opens two days before that on March 13, where teams will be able to negotiate with free agents before the official start of the 2023 season. 2023 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. 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. He often lightened the mood after she argued with her husband, teasing that his daughter talked too much. Wheres Grandpa? Troy asked her. 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. }); A news cameraman wrestled with his tripod. Many are outraged after an 84-year-old Asian man was killed in San Francisco, and the District Attorney, Chesa Boudin, justified the actions of the killer. They will all be together.. That January, an old man yelled at her in Golden Gate Park something about a virus and going back to her country while she watched her sons, then 10 and 7, run in a playground. Monthanus wore a black wool cloak over a pleated dress that flew up as the boat pulled away from the dock. She wasnt sure if Troy even knew what was happening. Crime data from the district attorney offices in San Francisco County and Alameda County, which includes Oakland, show that people of Asian descent were less likely last year to be victims of crimes than other ethnic groups. On her drive home, Monthanus thought about a defendant she saw earlier in the courtroom. A young man in a gas mask and a bulletproof vest said he had flown in from New York City after seeing the video. This arrest data includes all information on current and previous arrests for Antoine Watson 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. People are grieving. arrested and chargedwith murder and elder abuse. . Chan shared a photo of the person he said attacked him, who appeared to be Black, with reporters. if(document.querySelector("#google_image_div")){ Sometimes Titus would walk into her bedroom to watch TV, see her turn away and ask, Mom, are you crying? Sometimes she walked into a room to see her own mother turn away, sniffling and cheering: Its OK! The video shows that the elderly man had no opportunity to protect himself, Assistant District Attorney Sean Connolly wrote in a motion seeking to detain Watson. ", 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.". A San Francisco man accused of killing an 84-year-old Thai grandfather in an attack that galvanized Asian Americans and helped spur a successful recall of the city's liberal prosecutor was ordered . A Feb. 9 report by Stop Asian American Pacific Islander Hate foundover 2,808 firsthand accounts of anti-Asian hate from 47 states and the District of Columbiabetween March 19, 2020 and Dec. 31, 2020, with 126 accounts (7.3% of total incidents)of anti-Asian hate involving Americans over 60 years old. The hearing was brief and procedural; a trial date has yet to be set. A monk leaned over and gently shook Vichas ashes into the lapping waves. In each case, the suspects were Black. Solidarity is what it should be, she says. Throughout 2020, multiple strangers had come at her seemingly out of nowhere. In the United States and elsewhere, private schools asked their Chinese international students not to return for the spring semester; shopkeepers turned away customers who appeared Asian; Chinatowns emptied. Video footage shows the teen running at Ratanapakdee and pushing him over, knocking him to the ground. We matter, and racism is killing us. When a video emerged showing a 91-year-old shoved to the ground in Chinatown in Oakland, Calif., the actors Daniel Dae Kim and Daniel Wu posted a $25,000 reward for anyone who had more information on the suspect, tweeting, Remember Vincent Chin, who was beaten to death by two white men in Detroit in 1982. Check out what's clicking on Foxnews.com. On Jan. 15, he received the first shot of the Moderna vaccine. Court documents give the victims name as Gilbert Diaz, and Carl Chan, a community leader and president of the Oakland Chinatown Chamber of Commerce, said the victim was Latino. Monthanus squatted and scrubbed as her mother poured a jug of water over the concrete, the headlights shining behind them. San Francisco's chief prosecutor addressed the January death of Vicha Ratanapakdee at a time when many Asian Americans feel targeted based on their race. 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. His death helped awaken the nation to a rise in anti-Asian violence. Last week, Mayor London Breed, joined by Police Chief Bill Scott and District Attorney Chesa Boudin, said violence in San Francisco would not be tolerated and that any perpetrators would "be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law," especially those who targeted children or the elderly. When I see photos of these Asian elders who have been attacked, the actor Simu Liu wrote in Variety, I see the embodiment of my own parents journey; their dreams and their struggles, their sorrow and their unwavering optimism. In April, while patrolling San Franciscos Chinatown, a former mayor and son of immigrants from Taishan and Hong Kong pointed to the bank across the street and told me his mother was mugged there a few years ago. He washed his face, put on a baseball cap and face mask and told his wife he would have the coffee she had prepared for him when he returned. }); After her graduation, when Ms. Monthanus married and decided to stay in San Francisco, Mr. Vicha and his wife came to help raise their grandchildren. There was no evidence depicted that the elderly man did anything to provoke the attack. The Department of Police stated that they identified Watson quickly. This image from CCTV footage shows the moment Vicha Ratanapakdee was fatally attacked in Anza Vista, San Francisco. I wonder if its my inner racism coming out. But I dont want it to be like that. Police later identified the suspect as Antoine Watson, 19. "Look, I believe in second chances. But let's try to make it work anyway. I met Monthanus one breezy afternoon in April at Wat Nagara Dhamma, a Buddhist temple outfitted inside a small two-story house across the street from Golden Gate Park. When a sibling bullies another sibling, and then they go to school, and then they bully other kids, its like a chain reaction., Then there was Monthanus and Eric. A strange voice picked up. Anyone can read what you share. . SAN FRANCISCO - In two unrelated cases, San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin said his office has filed charges against Lawrence Thomas and Tyjone Flournoy for the murder of 76-year-old private investigator Jack Palladino, and Antoine Watson for the murder of 86-year-old Vicha Ratanapakdee. 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. Then the flood came. We're less than two weeks away from the start of NFL free agency, which begins at 4 p.m. . Antoine Watson, 19, . More than 500 days after the incident, San Francisco Superior Court Judge Richard Darwin ruled that the evidence presented by the District Attorney's Office is enough for a murder trial. The 2023 salary cap has already been set . He left his home because of a family dispute and got in a traffic accident in San Francisco at 2 a.m. In the Bay Area, where Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders make up a quarter of the population, stories like Vichas sparked at least two opposing narratives. The grandmother of a teen who senselessly pushed and killed a Thai grandfather has said her grandson should walk free. You can dial 311 or 911, she reminded them. "New state funding allows the data gathering to continue, and the research will ultimately lead us to solutions that will make all communities safer.". pg.acq.push(function() { He was booked on suspicion of murder, elder abuse and assault with a deadly weapon. Vicha was one of only a few people in the village who spoke English well, Mr. Surachai said. 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}} Ratanapakdee's head hit the pavement as he fell. New images have continued to surface on a weekly, sometimes daily, basis. Officers discovered an 84-year-old man lying on the sidewalk, rendered aid and summoned medics to transport the victim to a hospital for life-threatening injuries. Hundreds of people hold a rally Sunday, Jan. 30, 2022, in San Francisco and five other U.S. cities to remember the death of 84-year-old Vicha Ratanapakdee. Please enter valid email address to continue. }); SAN FRANCISCO -- A suspect has been taken into custody following a deadly explosion and fire Thursday at a home in San Francisco's Sunset District that police said was being used as a clandestine drug lab.San Francisco police identified the suspect as 53-year-old Darron Price of San Francisco. I kept my promise, Dad, she said. The law was celebrated for recognizing the need to better track violence against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. Powered and implemented by FactSet Digital Solutions. pg.acq.push(function() { At a vigil in Madison Park in Oakland the week after the Atlanta shootings, a mother stood with her young son, holding a sign with Vichas face on it. After several weeks, the advocate replied that the office didnt have the budget to hire a translator. In addition, she obtained police documents that claimed toshowWatson "on surveillancegoing to a BMW after the crime retrieving a cell phone & walk back to Ratanapakdee & appear to take photos of him as he was dying.". But her mind swirled with bigger questions. In a quiet room upstairs draped in gold and red, she knelt before a shrine of Buddhas, vases filled with fresh tulips and a black-and-white portrait of her father. 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. That he still had a life ahead of him. 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. eventCategory: event.slot.getSlotElementId(), On January 29, 2021, investigators obtained an arrest warrant for Watson for 245(a)1 PC - Assault with a Deadly Weapon and 368(b)1 PC - Elder Abuse causing . If he had been murdered, Monthanus asked Eric, why wasnt it on the news? I think a lot of that grief and anger and scapegoating continues to be directed toward Asians.. concluded that the gunman, who killed himself after the shooting, had not acted out of bias or a desire to advance an ideology, but suffered from a mental illness and had committed suicidal murder. The Sikh Coalition, an advocacy group, published a statement asking the bureau to clarify how and why it ruled out bias as a motive: Though law enforcement has said this investigation is over, for all the families who lost loved ones, the survivors, the Sikh community and anyone else impacted by hate violence, these questions will remain forever.. The future me, the real me, says, I wish we could forgive everybody, and everybody should acknowledge this bad thing happened. And right now it feels like, maybe, his family sees me as an enemy. },false) 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. Antoine Watson previously pleaded not guilty to murder and elder abuse charges for the daylight attack on Anza . You know what she said? Other celebrities joined in. 2023 FOX News Network, LLC. I was like, There is something going on here. At the first few rallies they attended, Eric casually surveyed attendees, asking whether they had ever been spit on or pushed and what the race of the perpetrator was. Rachel Marshall / (415) 416-4468 / Rachel.Marshall@sfgov.org - SAN FRANCISCO-Today, San Francisco District Attorney Boudin announced that the District Attorney's Office has filed charges against two people for the crime that took the life of 76 year-old private investigator Jack Palladino and will file charges against one person for the murder of 84 year-old Vicha Ratanapakdee. When Monthanus had a gripe with the landlord or a stranger who crossed her, he would tell her to let it go, to leave it to karma. if(document.querySelector("#ads")){ Hes 19 years old to be in jail. SAN FRANCISCO, CAA San Francisco African-American teen accused of murdering 84-year-old Vicha Ratanapakdee in January 2021 was ordered to stand trial, a judge ruled Friday.. Anita Nabha, 20-year-old Antoine Watson's attorney, said he was distressed after a "stressful encounter with police hours earlier" and may not have known the man was elderly, reports the San . },false) Her hope was for all people to work together, and not blame each other. MEAWW brings you the best content from its global team of I want to know the truth. San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin has sparked outrage on social media after telling the New York Times that 19-year-old Antoine Watson was "in some sort of a temper tantrum" when he . Their marigold robes glowed in the sun. As the Lunar New Year approached in February, hundreds of people went out to protest the attacks. / CBS San Francisco. That afternoon, the couple taped their first interview, with the KTVU reporter Evan Sernoffsky, near the courthouse steps. This January, Vicha was eager to regain his stamina after a recent series of heart operations, so that he could walk again for longer distances. San Francisco police have arrested 19-year-old Antoine Watson of Dale City on suspicion of murder, along with Malaysia Goo, 20, for allegedly serving as an accessory after the attack. She watched him for several more hours, his hand in hers. Ratanapakdee died after sustaining severe injuries. A close friend, also searching, sent her two links that vaguely mentioned Vicha, including an article published in Chinese by KTSF, a local outlet serving a primarily Chinese American audience. After Vicha died, Eric says, he saw so many videos, video after video of attacks in the news. Monthanus was too emotional then. In March, just before the country went into lockdown, a woman swung at Monthanus outside a hospital; she ducked the punch before running across the street. Patrol officers' body camera footage of the encounter led officers to later identify Watson as the suspect in the murder of Ratanapakdee. Ratanapakdee was brought to San Francisco General Hospital, but he eventually died on Saturday. Instead, he paused for a moment and turned right, as though whatever caught his eye made him decide to change course. 2021 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. 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. First published on February 8, 2021 / 3:17 PM. document.querySelector("#google_image_div").addEventListener('click',function(){ For weeks, Monthanus Ratanapakdee urged her parents to please. . You've successfully subscribed to this newsletter! She could see that Vichas death meant something bigger than her own grief, that he was part of a history that preceded her and a future she could help shape. Less than 24 hours later, a spokesman for the Cherokee County sheriff reduced the rampage to the act of a sex addict having a really bad day; then it was revealed that the same spokesman reportedly promoted T-shirts calling the coronavirus an IMPORTED VIRUS FROM CHY-NA. The rage boiled over. Maybe he went to Target, a few blocks from their home, where he liked to grab a coffee and browse the aisles. Family believes attack of 84-year-old man in San Francisco was racial motivated. 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. Among Asian-Americans, many of whom have endured racist taunts, rants and worse during the coronavirus pandemic, the killing of a defenseless older man became a rallying cry. There was no longer any way to ignore the violence that was happening to people who look like us, Mr. Ham said. But we dont want to give up, because unless everybodys safe in that community, nobody is., Lyslynn Lacoste, who runs a city program called BMAGIC and works with Wans group, told me that undoing misperceptions between communities had no quick fix. There were debates among Black residents about what contributed to the shortage of affordable housing, Lacoste says, but tension also took subtler, more pervasive forms the kind she could feel most recently at a neighborhood beauty-supply store when an Asian clerk followed her as she shopped. 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. There was no longer any way to ignore the violence that was happening to people who look like us., Antoine Watson, a 19-year-old resident of neighboring Daly City, was arrested two days after the attack and charged with murder and elder abuse. Mr. Watsons lawyer, Sliman Nawabi, a public defender, said his client would not have been able to identify Mr. Vichas ethnicity through his face mask, cap and winter clothing. Watson is accused in the deadly attack of Vicha Ratanapakdee in the city's Anza Vista neighborhood on January 28. In Thailand, the killing was front-page news and described as barbaric, a life cut short in a family where siblings typically live into their late 90s, relatives say. },false) window.googletag.pubads().addEventListener('slotRenderEnded', function(event) { Legal Statement. 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. She told her husband, Eric Lawson, who rushed home from the restaurant where he worked. During one appointment, the therapist asked if he felt angry, and he replied in that sheepish preteen way, I dont know. Monthanus knew the extra sessions were probably a lot, on top of school, weekend Thai and coding classes and the therapist he already sees to manage his A.D.H.D. When they got home, he pulled out her phone, and instead of putting on his usual cartoons, he scrolled through her photos. But one day last year, while biking near her house, an elderly man shouted at her, You dont belong here. Another time, while walking around the neighborhood with her son, they waved and smiled at a young lady who was listening to music and dancing. The video was taken from the same angle as the clip that everyone saw, only this footage was longer. $300,000 a year is roughly what a family of four needs to earn to live a middle-class lifestyle in the Bay Area. 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. June 18, 2022. I believe people are better than the worst things they have done," said Breed. As two bailiffs escorted Antoine out, the young man in the back left the courtroom and returned with a baby in his arms. Why did this happen? Then Came a Brutal Attack. Inside, Monthanus held her composure as her frustration grew. The family of the 84-year-old San Francisco man killed in a seemingly random attack believes it was a racist act. Antoine didnt wake up Jan. 28, 2021, with the idea of shoving somebody down and killing them, regardless of their race or gender. 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. But in practice, proving bias is difficult, especially when theres no explicit expression of it. . He died of a brain hemorrhage in a San Francisco hospital two days later. While it does not change the legal definition of a hate crime, the legislation commits funds to fast-track federal reviews of hate-crime investigations and approves grants for local law enforcement agencies. Notifications can be turned off anytime from browser settings. SAN FRANCISCO Weary of being cooped inside during the pandemic, . On the corner where Vicha paused in his steps, theres a view of the bay and the skyscrapers downtown. Even inside the anti-Asian-hate movement, every expression of grief and resolution differed. After the last court hearing, Monthanus called the victims advocate assigned to her by the district attorneys office to request a Thai translator. 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) The stories filled Monthanus with questions. The rallies had become a place where the couple could not only feel less alone in their grief but also seek answers they couldnt seem to get elsewhere. 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.