A hate crime allegedly perpetrated by “white America” turned out to be hoax perpetuated by a black criminal with an ax to grind against President Trump.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police arrested 32-year-old Curtis Flournoy on Sunday for firebombing the immigrant-operated Central Market in east Charlotte in what they’re characterizing as a pre-planned hate crime, according to The Charlotte Observer.
Investigators allege Flournoy threw a rock through the store’s window last Thursday, followed by a flaming object that started a blaze at the store owned by Indian immigrants.
A typed letter left behind read:
Our newly elected president Donald Trump is our nation builder for white America. You all know that, we want our country back on the right track. We need to get rid of Muslims, Indians and all immigrants. Specially, we don’t want business run by refugees and immigrant any more.
We are ready to wake up some of our great state including North Carolina and we will take care of the country. Immigrants and refugee are taking our job, doing business and leaving us standard. So, you are not allowed to do business any more.
We know you are one and many of other immigrant doing business here. This is our warning. Leave the business and go back to where you came from.
If you don’t follow this warning then we are not responsible for the torture starting now.
God Bless America …
White America
“Kamal Dhimal, the owner, is from Bhutan,” WBTV reports. “He says he became a U.S. citizen last year, and is shaken up by the incident.”
“There is no word to express how I am feeling,” Dhimal told WSOC shortly after the incident. “It makes me scared for the refugee and immigration.”
Local police worked with federal officials to investigate the hate crime, and video surveillance from the store led them to Flournoy, who was charged with burning a building of trade, malicious damage by use of incendiary material, felony breaking and entering, ethnic intimidation and anonymous or threatening letters, WBTV reports.
The incident also prompted action from “White America,” including one person who set up a GoFundMe page to raise $2,500 to help repair the store.
“Dhimal is a Bhutan refugee, who fled to Nepal in the early 1990s. He moved to the United States in 2010, and started his business in 2014. He said he has never encountered anti-immigrant sentiments while in the United States, though he said the letter is a sign that people don’t understand the importance of immigrants and refugees in the community,” wrote Erik Hovind, who started the fundraising effort.
“He is now doubting whether he will re-open his business, due to the implied threats in the letter,” he wrote. “Lets show Mr. Dhimal what this country TRULY thinks of its immigrants.”
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