A Florida woman faces charges of hate crime after authorities said she reprimanded a group of women with anti-Asian comments and sprayed them with pepper spray in New York last week. The New York Police Department announced on Friday that it had arrested Madeleine Barker, 47, after the incident, which was partly recorded on video. The victims told ABC7 New York that they were walking in the Meatpacking area of Manhattan around 6 pm on June 11 when a woman accused them of harassing her. The victims said they had no previous interaction with the woman, but tried to calm her down by apologizing to her. In response, the perpetrator took out a box of pepper spray and shouted at them: “Go back to where you came from, you do not belong here,” a victim told ABC7. Spray four women with pepper solution and shouted at an Asian man walking down the sidewalk to take the women “back to where you came from,” using a verbal expression, a police spokesman told CNN. According to police, the victims refused medical help at the scene. The video provided by the New York Post shows a woman, dressed in shiny fuchsia, running behind a woman and spraying her with pepper from behind as she walks away. The NYPD Hate Crimes Task Force posted photos of the fuchsia woman last week, he then tweeted that he had made an arrest “thanks to the help of everyday New Yorkers.” Barker, from Merritt Island, Florida, was charged Saturday with three counts of hate crime, one count of attempted hate crime and four counts of aggravated harassment, according to a Manhattan District Attorney. Office. When a still image emerged from the video, Barker admitted to being the woman in the incident, according to the complaint. San Francisco police record 567% increase in hate crime reports against Asia in 2021 Barker was held on $ 20,000 bail Sunday afternoon, according to jail records, and her next court appearance was scheduled for Thursday. Her ombudsman did not immediately respond to a request for comment Sunday afternoon. Hate crimes against Asian Americans have risen sharply since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic. In New York, hate crimes against Asia increased by 357% between 2020 and 2021, according to the NYPD. Christina Yuna Lee’s murder “hits so close to home” for Asian American women in New York Despite legislative efforts to intensify hate crime investigations, the violence has not subsided in 2022. This year, two high-profile murders of Asian Americans in New York City shocked Asian communities there. In January, Michelle Alyssa Go, 40, was pushed into subway lines at Times Square. In February, a man chased Christina Yuna Lee, 35, into her Manhattan apartment and stabbed her to death. Later that month, a man is brought attacked seven Asian women in two hours in a 30-square-meter area in Manhattan. He was charged with 13 hate crimes. Recent killings of Asian Americans force Asians abroad to reconsider their relationship with US The K-pop BTS group appeared in the White House last month to raise awareness about the rise of hate crimes against Asia, which have particularly targeted women and the elderly. Amanda Nguyen, chief executive of the non-profit political rights group Rise, told The Washington Post Live in March that “racial and gender intersection is something we can not ignore.” “Unfortunately, these acts of violence targeting the Asian American community, especially women, existed before the coronavirus,” he said. “The pandemic has completely exacerbated these issues, especially when we have had leaders who say things like ‘Chinese virus’ or ‘Chinese flu.’ Rise founder and CEO Amanda Nguyen joins the Washington Post Live (Video: The Washington Post)
