Prosecutors in Alameda County, California, have filed hate crime charges against a California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation employee who was filmed earlier this month ridiculing a Muslim man and throwing coffee on him. The incident was captured on cellphone video.
Denise Slader, who is employed as a program technician with the department’s Adult Parole Operations, was charged Wednesday with multiple misdemeanor counts of battery and committing a hate crime. A court date was set for January 2016.
In the video, which you can see below this story, Slader can be seen telling the Muslim men who were praying in a public park:
“The people you tortured, they’re going to spend eternity in heaven. You are very deceived by Satan. Your mind has been taken over, brainwashed, and you have nothing but hate, nothing but hate.”
East Bay Regional Park District spokesperson Carolyn Jones said of the incident:
“This kind of intolerance is totally unacceptable. It’s just appalling on 50 different levels.”
The man seen in the video who speaks to Slader and received the brunt of her tirade, Rasheed Albeshari, was born inTennessee and moved to Yemen with his family as a child. He returned to the U.S. several years ago at the request of his father, who told him:
“Son, go back to your country; that’s where you can find your future.”
Albeshari said that shortly after the posted the video on Facebook, he received an outpouring of support from other social media users:
“It’s just overwhelming. I think that’s what makes this nation great: tolerance and acceptance.”
Officials with the Department of Corrections did not comment on Slader’s actions, the charges against her, or her future employment with the department.
This is the Video That Led to the Hate Crime Charges
This article was originally published by the same author at LiberalAmerica.org.