He was also on a waiting list to become a registered gun owner. The alleged killer is Daly City resident Antoine Watson, who was 19 at the time of the seemingly unprovoked sidewalk attack in the Anza Vista neighborhood. She tried to shield them from the video, but sometimes the evening news would be on and the footage would flash by before she could turn it off. No one helped him because they thought he had Covid, Jeung says. Let it go. But inevitably they would get in the car with a poster of Vicha in the back. 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. He was arrested along with Maylasia Goo, 20 . And in a way I kind of am. Patrol officers' body camera footage of the encounter led officers to later identify Watson as the suspect in the murder of Ratanapakdee. 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. Monthanus and Eric had been busy arranging her fathers funeral while fielding phone calls and messages from family, friends and strangers. I just want to know why he did it. Considering him being 19 or even older now, he is no longer a child and is capable enough to keep his hands to himself. An anti-hate rally outside the San Francisco civic center this month. 2023 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. 84-year-old San Francisco resident Vicha Ratanapakdee was the target of the brazen and unprovoked daytime attack last Thursday morning. Anyone can read what you share. Yet today I still face people from the Black community who will come into our office on a weekly basis, saying that we only care about our people, that we just take their resources. ET on March 15. (Eric, who worked at two restaurants as a server and manager before the pandemic, was on unemployment.) Sliman Nawabi, a deputy public defender representing Watson, disputed the perception that the attack was racially motivated. ga('ads.send', { Ratanapakdee was on his morning walk last Thursday at around 8:28 a.m. in Anza Vista, San Francisco when Watson rushed towards the victim and pushed him to the ground. Surveillance video showed Ratanapakdee walking in the driveway of a home when the suspect barrels him into the victim violently, knocking him to the ground before the suspect casually walks away in the same direction he came from. As Vicha recovered from each operation, Monthanus had slept on the floor next to his bed, comforting him through the pain. Among the most alarming were the stories of a 57-year-old Asian woman who was pushed off a railway platform onto the tracks, and an 83-year-old Asian man who died from a head injury after being assaulted by a group of boys. He has pled not guilty to charges of murder and elder abuse causing death. When her mother saw the video, she stiffened. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. Evan Sernoffsky reports. Watson is accused in the deadly attack of Vicha Ratanapakdee in the city's Anza Vista neighborhood on January 28. Two days after the attack, Ms. Monthanus and her mother went to the spot where Mr. Vicha was killed and saw that his blood still stained the pavement. . For Mr. Vicha, who stood 5 feet 6 inches and weighed 113 pounds, the attack was fatal. A local ABC News affiliate had posted footage from a surveillance camera. But Jeung grew wary when a doctor asked him if he had recently been to China, and again when he learned that his relatives had been marooned at a hotel near the airport after being told they couldnt board their flight back home. He has pled not guilty to charges of murder and elder abuse causing death. Right, Mr. Vicha receiving the first dose of a coronavirus vaccine. Monthanus gave the nurse her fathers name, his medical-record number and his six prescriptions, which included a high dose of blood thinners. Instead, he paused for a moment and turned right, as though whatever caught his eye made him decide to change course. On the morning of Jan. 28, when Monthanus and the children were still asleep, he prepared to head out. You can dial 311 or 911, she reminded them. When she made it to the hill, she noticed a neighbor working in his garage and asked if he knew where the episode happened the other day. Four of the victims were Sikh, prompting calls to examine whether the gunman was motivated by bias. The question is: Does it prevent things like this from happening again? She continued: Regardless of the laws intent, how its received is, This is disingenuous, because were using the same tools to fix the problem. arrested and chargedwith murder and elder abuse. Monthanus knew she should find a counselor for herself, too. They sailed toward the Golden Gate Bridge, the choppy waters jostling them as they chanted the Five Precepts. Monthanuss body went numb. Some assailants have yelled slurs while throwing a punch or slashing at their victims with a knife. Two suspects have been arrested. Im not a cop. I know thats totally crazy, he said, but I get that feeling sometimes. 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. Ratanapakdee is seen walking in the driveway of a home when the suspect barrels him into the victim violently, knocking him to the ground before the suspect casually walks away in the same direction he came from. The group filed out to the edge of the deck. It appears that the defendant was in some sort of a temper tantrum, Mr. Boudin said. "Look, I believe in second chances. 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. And these memories, the sense of injustice that still lingered in them, overlapped with other histories still. 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. Thats when I was like: This is more than some kind of accident or robbery or assault. You know what she said? The law was celebrated for recognizing the need to better track violence against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. For months Mr. Vicha had been pining to return to Thailand but was unable to because of the pandemic. His mother, who was also laid off from her job during lockdown, found work through relatives in another state and was, for a while, supporting the family from afar. Eric and Monthanus being interviewed by a local TV station outside the Hall of Justice in San Francisco in July. Then one day, after knocking on a neighbors door to ask about their surveillance footage, she returned to her car to find Troy crying in the back seat. another video that rocketed around the internet. A.Cecil Williams told The New York Times in an article about the 2010 protest. The trust-building really took us 10 years, Wan says. His older daughter, Monthanus, described her father as a devoted Buddhist. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/17/magazine/vicha-ratanapakdee.html. She tried calling it. Monthanus and Eric posed for photos and signed a petition to recall Chesa Boudin, as people stopped to greet them with elbow bumps and condolences. That he still had a life ahead of him. He didnt take anything from my father, not even the tablet, she says. Its still there. Watson entered a not guilty plea to charges of murder . }) MEAWW is an initialism for Media Entertainment Arts WorldWide. When they got home, he pulled out her phone, and instead of putting on his usual cartoons, he scrolled through her photos. ALSO READ: Suspects Sought In Home Invasion Robbery Of Elderly Woman In San Francisco. San Francisco Mayor, Police Chief, DA Condemn Fatal Assaults On Seniors; Vow To Address Violence, denounced the recent rise in violent crimes in the city, 76-year-old private investigator Jack Palladino, Suspects Sought In Home Invasion Robbery Of Elderly Woman In San Francisco, Public File for KBCW-TV / KBCW 44 Cable 12. },false) Her father had been assaulted and taken to a hospital, a police officer said. A lawyer for Antoine Watson, the defendant, argued that the case should be charged as involuntary manslaughter because he had no intent to kill. A few days later, Eric asked me if I saw the news about the recent attack on Carl Chan, the head of Oaklands Chinatown Chamber of Commerce, who has been a vocal supporter of increasing foot patrols and camera surveillance in the neighborhood. She wanted to be strong for her sons, but she had trouble sleeping at night and broke into tears unexpectedly. Powered and implemented by FactSet Digital Solutions. His brothers and sisters are there, Ms. Monthanus said. We also identified his female associate as 20-year-old Maylasia Goo also of Daly . Nawabi described the incident as an impulsive unmotivated assault that resulted from the mental-health breakdown of a teenager. After reading about an Asian American teenager in the Los Angeles area who was hospitalized in February after being bullied about Covid, Jeung contacted colleagues at two advocacy groups in California. He Came From Thailand to Care For Family. One was that there was a pattern of Black perpetrators and Asian victims, that the pattern was a symptom of a tension dating back decades. For Sarah Wan, a community organizer who has been helping victims of violence in San Francisco, the debate brought back memories from 2010, when hundreds gathered outside City Hall to protest a series of similar reports. Jaeah Lee is a magazine journalist based in San Francisco, with a focus on criminal justice. But her mind swirled with bigger questions. Then Came a Brutal Attack. No one had been able to identify Vicha his pockets contained a quarter and a pair of keys. A strange voice picked up. ga('ads.send', { Why, since her fathers death, did it feel as if there were more cases every day? Rev. It was the second such march in a week; the first, in Oakland, California, also drew dozens of supporters, many of them carrying signs demanding that racism be stamped out, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. There had been so many attacks since the one on her father. Other celebrities joined in. 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. An 84-year-old man was killed after he was brutally attacked on a San Francisco street. Watson entered a not guilty plea to charges of murder and elder abuse causing death during the brief court appearance. In an unprovoked attack, Antoine Watson, 19, charged at Vichar Ratanapakdee, 84, on Thursday during the senior's morning walk. }); I know its not a scientific poll or whatever. The responses confirmed a thought in his mind all the same. Even inside the anti-Asian-hate movement, every expression of grief and resolution differed. She clutched a few sheets of paper in one hand. All rights reserved. Inside, Monthanus held her composure as her frustration grew. Before his third heart operation, Vicha debated whether to go through with the procedure; he wasnt sure if he would make it. Walking was how he explored San Francisco when he first arrived there from Thailand in 2000, to spend a year with Monthanus while she attended business school, and again in 2018, to help take care of her two sons. The family of a Thai senior citizen who died after being violently knocked to the . Antoine Watson arrested assault w/deadly weapon & elder abuse. His orange jumpsuit fit loosely over his tall frame, chains linking his wrists, his hair growing out. Give him a chance, she could hear her father saying. They asked the state attorney generals office to help them track what they believed to be a growing number of episodes. 2023 FOX News Network, LLC. Monthanus was too emotional then. reporters on a platform technologically tailored to meet the needs of the modern reader. Antoine Watson, a 19-year-old resident of neighboring Daly City, was arrested two days after the attack and charged with . 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. We were like, Is this a hate crime? He was like, I cant talk about this, Eric says. 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. When we go to the beach we can dream that he is with us., She plans to bring the other urn back to her fathers hometown in southern Thailand, where the local Buddhist temple has a stupa that holds the familys remains. Eric complimented his vest and said he thought about wearing his. 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. Its nonstop, you know? She thought about the people she had met at the rallies who had quit their jobs to patrol or speak out full time. In each case, the suspects were Black. Eric also busied himself with emails to architects and building managers in Chinatown, where he was planning a mural a few blocks from the Dragon Gate. Watson was arrested along with a female associate he was with at the time of the assault. Wans group, Community Youth Center, responded by opening a new office in Bayview-Hunters Point, where the attacks occurred. eventAction: 'click_adunit' Police arrested two people Saturday in connection with Thursday's filmed attack that left an elderly California man dead. Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by Refinitiv Lipper. Around the same time as the Oakland rally, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), who represents the Bay Area, and Rep. Judy Chu (D-CA) also denounced the "white supremacy . Monthanus arrived at the steps of the San Francisco Hall of Justice, an imposing concrete building that spans a city block, where Antoine Watson was scheduled to appear for a pretrial hearing. Im fine, even if hes in a wheelchair or doesnt wake up, she said. Intravenous lines and electrode patches linked his body to a constellation of machines and bags of fluid. We dont know how to attribute this rise in reporting, he told me. Monthanus wondered at first, her mind thick with shock. A nurse came in and explained that the surgeon hadnt been able to stop the bleeding. Whenever she left the house, she tested a can of pepper spray in the bathroom, the fumes burning her eyes, before tucking it in her pocket. The spokespersonnotedthat, if there were such documents, police could and would not be able to release them due to the incident being under an active homicide investigation. Now that Mr. Vicha Ratanapakdee has died of his injuries, prosecution for this murderous hate crime is the only path to justice and community safety. Later, as more information trickled in, Eric changed stolen vehicle to a car disabled by an earlier hit-and-run; he also replaced thug with adult male, after watching an episode of S.W.A.T. in which a Black cop explained the words racist undertones to his partner. Why was no one intervening? Officers arrested Antoine Watson, 19, and his female companion . On the corner where Vicha paused in his steps, theres a view of the bay and the skyscrapers downtown. 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. if(document.querySelector("#adunit")){ He gets talked about as though he's some little baby minor. . Their landlord had sent a series of noise complaints and eviction warnings. Ratanapakdee was brought to San Francisco General Hospital, but he eventually died on Saturday. In reference to the alleged attacker Antoine Watson, Boudin told the Times that "It appears that the defendant was in some sort of a temper tantrum." .