SAN JOSE, Calif. – Civil rights activists are calling on prosecutors to file felony hate-crime charges against four white students accused of harassing a black student at San Jose State University.
NAACP leaders are urging Santa Clara County District Attorney Jeff Rosen to bring felony charges against the white students, who currently face misdemeanor hate-crime and battery charges.
“This is not simple hazing or bullying. This is obviously racially based terrorism targeted at their African American roommate,” Reverend Jethroe Moore II, president of the San Jose/Silicon Valley NAACP said in a statement Saturday. “The community will not stand idly by and allow for any student of color to be terrorized simply due to the color of his skin.”
According to a police report, the white students taunted their freshman dorm-mate with racial slurs, outfitted their dormitory suite with a Confederate flag, barricaded the victim in his room and placed a U-shaped bicycle lock around his neck.
In a statement Saturday, Rosen says he believes his office has filed the “appropriate charges in this case, based upon the evidence,” according to the San Jose Mercury News.