{"id":30441,"date":"2017-05-23T06:16:47","date_gmt":"2017-05-23T06:16:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/?p=30441"},"modified":"2017-05-23T06:16:47","modified_gmt":"2017-05-23T06:16:47","slug":"officials-decline-call-fatal-stabbing-black-student-hate-crime","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.biphoo.com\/bipnews\/news\/officials-decline-call-fatal-stabbing-black-student-hate-crime.html","title":{"rendered":"Officials Decline to Call Fatal Stabbing of Black Student a Hate Crime"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tOfficials Decline to Call Fatal Stabbing of Black Student a Hate Crime<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/strong>
\n<\/h2>\n

\n\tOfficials Decline to Call Fatal Stabbing of Black Student a Hate Crime:- The police found the white man, a student at the University of Maryland, at around 3:30 a.m. Saturday, sitting on a campus bench a few feet away from the spot where witnesses said he had plunged his knife into a black man’s chest.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tThe victim was pronounced dead sometime after 4 a.m., just three days before he was scheduled to graduate from nearby Bowie State University.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd amid inflamed anxieties about a rebranded white-power movement, the question that enveloped both young men’s campuses was why.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tThe authorities charged Sean C. Urbanski, 22, with assault and first- and second-degree murder in the death of Richard W. Collins III, 23, who had just been commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Army and was preparing to move to Fort Leonard Wood, Mo., for training in defending the country against chemical attacks.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tOn Sunday, officials said they were investigating the killing as a possible hate crime, citing a Facebook group to which Mr. Urbanski had belonged, called “Alt-Reich: Nation.”<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tBut in a news conference late Monday, the Prince George’s County state’s attorney, Angela D. Alsobrooks, said Mr. Urbanski’s motive was unclear, though she did not rule out racial animus.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t“We do not have enough evidence to say conclusively whether this is a hate crime,” she said. “What we can say is that we will leave no stone unturned.”<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tThe F.B.I.’s Baltimore office was assisting the campus police to try to determine whether a hate crime was committed, a spokesman said.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tOn Monday, a judge ordered Mr. Urbanski held without bail. At the hearing, Mr. Urbanski’s lawyer said that alcohol and substance abuse might have played a role in the attack.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd on Monday night, students and faculty at Bowie State, a historically black college founded in 1865, held a solemn vigil on the eve of the ceremony at which Mr. Collins would have received his diploma.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t“Richard was an outstanding individual,” said Lt. Col. Joel Thomas, head of the university’s Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, in which Mr. Collins was active. “He was an outstanding cadet. He was an outstanding member of this campus community.”<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tSome new details emerged about Mr. Urbanski’s life, and about the Facebook group of which he was a member.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tThe group’s public profile was inaccessible on Monday. Screenshots showed that its members had earlier trafficked in anti-black and sexist memes. But Alex Goodman, 19, an administrator of the group, said it had been started a few months ago as satire and was in fact partly intended to make fun of the so-called alt-right.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t“Nothing is meant as true; we follow none of the beliefs,” Mr. Goodman, who described himself as pagan, said. “None of us believe in that philosophy. I condemn those who believe in white supremacy.”<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tMatthew Lamb, 26, who said he had founded the Facebook group, said he and his friends had “spent two days trying to come up with a funny name,” adding: “I don’t care if it’s offensive. It’s supposed to be offensive.”<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t“But oh God, no,” he said. “It’s not white supremacist or a Nazi group, and I’m not a white supremacist.”<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tThe authorities drew no conclusions about the Facebook group. “It’s too early to speculate about whether or not it was a hate group or a hate page,” said John Erzen, spokesman for the Office of the State’s Attorney in Prince George’s County.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tMr. Goodman said Mr. Urbanski was not an active member of the Facebook group. “He did not list much, and I never saw him comment or like anything,” he said.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tIn an interview on Monday, a friend of Mr. Urbanski’s who has known him for about 10 years described him as a “chill dude and a good dude who I never saw show hate towards any person or any kinds of people.”<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tThe friend, who had worked with Mr. Urbanski at Severna Park Lanes, a bowling alley, over the years, insisted on anonymity to avoid being associated with the case in the eyes of potential employers.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tMr. Urbanski started at the bowling alley as a janitor and worked his way up to a position behind the counter, said the friend, who has known him since middle school. He “was dependable and always reported for his shifts,” the friend said, adding that Mr. Urbanski also held a job at a gym and had talked about becoming a physical therapist after graduating.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t“I never saw him show any visible signs of an anger problem,” the friend said. “Occasionally, he’d get annoyed at a customer, but we all did.”<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tMr. Urbanski, he said, was “one of the last persons I would imagine doing something like this.”<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tAccording to the University of Maryland Police, Mr. Collins and two friends were standing at a bus stop in front of the Montgomery Hall dormitory when they heard Mr. Urbanski screaming, and watched as he approached them.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t“Step left, step left if you know what’s best for you,” Mr. Urbanski said, according to the police. Mr. Collins said no, and Mr. Urbanski plunged a three- to four-inch silver blade into his chest, the police said a witness told them.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tThe killing cast a pall over what ordinarily would have been a festive period on both campuses.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tAt the University of Maryland, Regina Lapierre, the mother of two students, laid a bouquet of flowers at the bus stop where Mr. Collins was stabbed.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t“I feel so sad for the family of this poor man,” she said, saying the crime seemed “very random” on what she believed was a “very safe campus.”<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tAt Bowie State, Mr. Collins was known as a focused student, lithe and athletic, and was deeply involved with the R.O.T.C.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tColonel Thomas said Mr. Collins had attended college on a military scholarship, excelled at physical training, and often joined his fellow cadets in training students in middle school and high school Junior R.O.T.C. programs.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tAt the student center, he was quick to challenge passers-by to a game of table tennis. “He was so competitive when it came to Ping-Pong,” said Emanuel Karunwi, a sophomore.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tMr. Collins’s Facebook page revealed a young man with wide-ranging tastes, and both a serious and silly side. He wrote about the death of a hamster named Keonté, and admired the hip-hop group Migos and the composer Philip Glass.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t“I love all people and hate ignorance but I myself am ignorant so I am still working on loving all people,” he wrote in 2014.<\/span><\/span><\/span>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tSource:- https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2017\/05\/22\/us\/black-student-stabbed-maryland.html<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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