A black sociology professor at Virginia Tech accused a group of white men in pickup trucks of targeting him with racial harassment at his home. His account was picked up by the group Indivisible which called it a hate crime and a "despicable act of racist intimidation and harassment." But after an investigation, local police determined there was no intent and no hate crime had occurred.
Professor Onwubiko “Biko” Agozino, a self-described scholar-activist with interests in the race-class-gender articulation, said he believed he was targeted earlier this month after several young white men in trucks pulled up in front of his house blaring music and throwing snow and ice from one vehicle.
Here's a bit of the Indivisible statement describing what happened.
NRV Indivisible vehemently condemns the recent, despicable act of racist intimidation and harassment that occurred in our community. Dr. Biko Agozino (who recently ran for delegate in the 42d district) and his family were targeted at their home by a group of 8 white young men riding in four 4 different trucks. The young white men parked in front of Dr. Agozino’s home and unleashed a torrent of racial slurs, including the N-word, and threw ice bricks onto the property, blocking his driveway. This hateful assault was accompanied by the blaring of music, specifically Drake’s “Energy,” in a calculated effort to terrorize and intimidate Biko and his family.
The incident has been reported to the Christiansburg police department and they are looking into the incident further, according to Dr. Agozino.
This incident is not merely a case of disorderly conduct; it is a hate crime, and it is both illegal and profoundly immoral...
We call upon law enforcement to conduct a thorough and swift investigation into this incident and to pursue all available charges under Virginia’s hate crime statutes. The actions described fall squarely within the legal definition of a hate crime under Virginia Code § 52-8.5, which includes criminal acts intended to instill fear or intimidation based on race.
They got the song right, but that's about all.
The local police in Christiansburg, Virginia did investigate but determined that no hate crime had occurred. After speaking to the men in the trucks, they determined they had been in the area for some kind of function at a nearby house. One of them stopped in the street to clear ice from the bed of his pickup truck. All of them were listening to loud rap music.
After several interviews, including a third-party eyewitness, and a detailed investigation, detectives found that a group of juveniles were attending an organized function at a home in the area. Before departure, two juveniles attempted to clear frozen snow and ice out of the bed of a truck, but were unable to completely remove, due to the slope of the vehicle. Upon departure, the juveniles stopped at a flat spot on the street, where a juvenile pushed out the remaining frozen snow and ice.
There have been incorrect reports that this may have been a targeted incident toward a specific residence or person based on racial bias...Our investigation has found no evidence of criminal intent or racial bias...
At no time did any juveniles yell obscenities, or direct attention to any homes in the area while clearing the snow and ice.
The supposed victim of this incident filmed it from an upstairs window in his home. I've watched it a few times and it confirms the police account. There are several trucks out front for about a minute. One of the trucks is playing loud rap music and the N-word can be heard once. After three of the trucks leave, the final truck is the one where a guy is in the back pushing ice out of the bed. He's not saying anything besides "Ow!" at one point and he never looks in the direction of the professor's house. None of the kids in the video appear to have used the N-word or done anything directed at the house.
What I see is a black professor getting freaked out by white kids playing rap music outside his house for about 1 minute. It doesn't appear to me that any of them knew he was there or were focused on his house. They were just knuckleheads playing music too loud. That's irritating and I wouldn't like it in my neighborhood but it's definitely not a targeted hate crime worthy of arrest or prosecution.
If this professor wanted to go on a rant about the offensive lyrics in rap music that a lot of kids (of all races) listen to these days, I'd probably agree with him. But you can't call it a crime if white kids occasionally mumble along with the music they like. And again, that doesn't seem to have happened here. The N-word came from the song, not from the kids.
Anyone who has been around teens knows they can sometimes be loud and dumb when left to themselves. Maybe a warning about blasting music in a nice neighborhood is appropriate here. But professor Agozino is not a kid and ought to be a lot more careful about accusing an entire group of kids of a hate crimes with no evidence. I'm assuming he was the source for the Indivisible complaint. Who else could it be? He's not a victim here no matter how much he wants to be one.
Finally, it'd be great if the kids and the professor could meet one another and everyone could just talk about what happened and clear the air like adults. That would probably be good for everyone involved. It might help the kids get a little perspective about how they appear to people who don't know them and it might help the professor calm down a bit about being targeted. But in this environment I don't get the impression that's likely to happen. That's too bad because if this just leads to more suspicious and bad feelings on both sides.
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