A soldier who pulled off a man's turban during an Edinburgh nightclub scuffle because he "didn't like" people with turbans has been fined £280.

Raty Yavala, 29, had just returned from fighting in Iraq with the First Scots Regiment when he went out in Edinburgh.

Yavala, from Fiji, was in the All Purple Bar in Hanover Street when he began arguing with another clubber.

Yavala pleaded guilty at Edinburgh Sheriff Court to a breach of the peace at the club on 30 September 2007.

Yavala, who is based at Dreghorn Barracks near Edinburgh, shouted and swore at the Sikh man before pulling off his turban and calling him a racist name. [Link]

Three North Shore men have been charged in federal court with terrorizing two Revere families just because they practice Islam.

Prosecutors of the U.S. Attorney’s Office have charged Adam J. Bonito, 21, of Revere, Christopher D. Giaquinto, 22, of Winthrop and a juvenile male with criminal conspiracy to commit a hate crime.

Christina DiIorio-Sterling, spokeswoman for U.S. Attorney Michael Sullivan’s Office, announced Friday that the suspects would be charged with vandalizing and damaging the vehicles of the two Muslim families, who lived in the same Revere duplex, in 2004 and 2005.

A press release about the case did not specify where in the city the victims lived.

Prosecutors allege, “it was the plan and purpose of the conspiracy to vandalize a van, believed to belong to one of the residents, in order to interfere with the victim’s housing rights because of race,” DiIorio-Sterling said. “The intended victim was an Arab Muslim person of Middle Eastern origin who lived at the duplex in Revere.” [Link]

As thousands of kids head back to New York City schools this week, the city unveiled a new plan to protect students from bullies and keep parents in the loop.

This week, middle and high school students are heading home with a "Respect for All" brochure, that teaches them what constitutes a bias-attack - which is harassment driven by prejudice.

The city announced new steps to stop the attacks, including a tracking system to monitor all reported bias incidents.

"Up till now, we really had no way of knowing if harassment in our schools was getting better or getting worse," Mayor Bloomberg said.

So starting this year, parents will be able to go on the Department of Education website, look up their child's school, and find out how many bias incidents have been reported.

Attacks in school on Sikh kids were getting so bad in parts of Queens - specifically, students getting their hair cut off, that the community held a protest rally. [Link]

He is here to treat people but now an Indian doctor whose nose was fractured in a racist attack in Lancashire says he wants to leave the UK.

The 32-year-old who does not wish to be named was subjected to racist abuse from a gang of teenagers as he tried to make his way to a late on-call shift.

Having lived in England for four years, two of which he spent in Southampton the doctor said he now wanted to leave the country for good. Over thirty percent of doctors working in UK hospitals are from abroad.
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"My perception of England is totally different now. This is not the England I was told about. And I would advise any doctor thinking of coming and working here to think twice.

"Although I have received no abuse on the hospital grounds, every other day since I moved to the area I have got the odd comment about the way I look but nothing like this.

"I'm trying to move, not only out of this area but out of the country. My wife says she does not feel safe here and wants to get out as soon as possible.

"She feels there is no guarantee that this won't happen again.

"I have friends across the world in America, Canada and the Middle-East. None of them have had this happen to them."

The incident happened as the doctor was heading to a shift at the hospital at 9.50pm when he was approached by a gang of about seven men, close to a Day and Night shop in the old Blackburn Infirmary area.

"It began with comments like Where is your mosque?' and We are paying for your taxes to be here'. Soon it deteriorated with more racial abuse like You black bastard'. I am Sikh and people's ignorance here is beyond belief.

"I thought this was nonsense as I am a highly skilled professional and it was not difficult for them to see I was a doctor - I had a stethoscope and a hospital badge on my jacket.

"Little do these people know that my wife and I pay over £10,000 in taxes and national insurance to live and work here.

"Soon one of them said We will kill your family if you don't move out. We know where you live.' And then he headbutted me."

Police confirmed they are investigating the incident and are still keen to speak to anyone with information about the attack.

They can contact Crimestoppers anonymously 0800 555 111.

Police are particularly keen to speak with a woman in a red car who stopped and spoke with the victim and may have seen what happened. [Link]

This was not a case of boys will be boys. The student who assaulted Sikh student Jagmohan Singh Premi, 18, last week at Richmond Hill High School in Queens was not playing games.

Premi's attacker wasn't just horsing around. He punched him in the face while holding a key between his knuckles, inflicting an orbital fracture and bruising. Sikhs have no doubt it was a hate crime. Certainly, it was no child's play.

"I am sad this is happening in America; I want to go to school to learn," said Premi, a shy, serious young man who wears the turban his religion prescribes for all Sikh men. The physical assault came after the attacker tried to rip off Premi's turban while he was sitting in class and, even more egregious, with the teacher in the room.

According to Amardeep Singh, executive director of the Sikh Coalition, the harassment did not begin last week.

"Jagmohan's tormentor has a long, documented history of harassing him in school, making fun of his patka [turban] and beard, and attempting to pull off his patka," Singh said.

Actually, the attacker had been suspended this year for trying to remove the Sikh teen's turban. But after he came back to school, the harassment continued unabated.

On July 16, 2007, the Sikh Coalition, an organization born after 9/11 to counter discrimination and bigotry, raised the issue of anti-Sikh harassment at Richmond Hill High School in a meeting with schools Chancellor Joel Klein. [Link]

A call centre worker has been awarded more than 22,000 pounds after winning a race and religious discrimination case against a company owned by entrepreneur and Rangers chairman Sir David Murray.

Lipka was awarded 15,000 pounds for injury to his feelings, an additional 3,750 pounds as the company had failed to follow the statutory grievance procedure, and 3,718 pounds in interest.

James Lipka (58), who worked for the Student Loans Company and Rangers Projects from Glasgow-based Response Handling's call centre in Ibrox Stadium, claimed that fellow members of staff had called him "Osama Bin Lipka", a "Mongol" and "Genghis Khan".

The abusive comments at his workplace got worse after the bombings in London on 7 July, 2005, with some of the agents becoming openly hostile towards Muslims, news.Scotsman.com reported. [Link]

The threatening letters arrived throughout 2006 and 2007 at two of Beacon Hill's most popular restaurants. They came with photos of gun-toting men and taunting messages for the owner of both eateries, a successful businesswoman who was born in Iran, came to the United States decades ago, and is an American citizen.
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A photograph of an Israeli soldier brandishing a machine gun was tucked inside one letter, while another contained an image of actor Dustin Hoffman, lifted from the 1976 movie thriller "Marathon Man," pointing a gun directly at the viewer.

"See you at the Taj!" the writer taunted in a letter sent last June, two days before the owner was to present food from her two eateries at Taste of Beacon Hill, a local restaurant fair hosted by the Taj Boston Hotel.

After months of investigation, the FBI announced yesterday that agents had arrested 65-year-old real estate broker Earl F. McBride Jr., who lives in a Bowdoin Street boarding house just a few blocks from the restaurants.

He's charged in a one-count federal indictment with mailing a series of threatening communications to the restaurant owner, beginning in November 2006.

"The reason the FBI takes this case so seriously is we do look on it as a potential hate crime," said Warren T. Bamford, special agent in charge of the FBI's Boston office, adding that investigators believe McBride targeted the restaurant owner because she is a Muslim.

"We're still trying to determine what [McBride's] motive and thought process was," Bamford said.

The restaurant owner, who is identified in the indictment only by her initials, does not know McBride, according to the FBI. She declined to comment about the case yesterday and asked the Globe not to name her.

"She's a hard-working, loyal American citizen who has been threatened for no reason other than her ethnic background," said Assistant US Attorney Brian T. Kelly, following a bail hearing for McBride yesterday in US District Court.

Initially, McBride was given a federal defender, who is paid by the government to represent defendants who cannot afford to hire their own lawyers.

But that quickly changed when Kelly told the court that when McBride was arrested yesterday morning he had a bank receipt in his pocket that indicated he had $90,000 in an account.

"I know based on this bank account he's not eligible for court-appointed counsel," said US Magistrate Judge Timothy S. Hillman, who instructed McBride to hire his own lawyer. An arraignment was sceheduled for May 22.

The magistrate released McBride on a $20,000 unsecured bond and ordered him to stay away from the two restaurants, all of their employees, and potential victims or witnesses in the case.

Dressed all in black - turtleneck sweater, dress slacks, and boots - McBride declined to comment as he left the courthouse after signing bond papers, saying he had been advised by his lawyer not to discuss the case.

The first threatening letter arrived at one of the woman's restaurants in November 2006, shortly after it opened. Then, according to the indictment, more letters soon arrived at the owner's other restaurant.

"It's an indication that this can happen anywhere, in suburbs and in affluent sections," Bamford said.

After the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, there was a spike in hate crimes against American Muslims for several years, according to Bamford.

While the number of such crimes has since dwindled, Bamford said they still happen, prompting the FBI to constantly do outreach in the American Muslim community so victims will come forward and report attacks or harassment. "We still continue to look at hate crimes as extremely serious cases," he said. [Link]

Members of the Sikh community are speaking out after three Douglas County men allegedly pulled a turban off a truck driver's head and drove off with it.

"There was basically a guy who stopped me and said I'm looking for a rag head to kill," said Eugene resident Pami Singh.

Singh says he's experienced hate before and blames it in on ignorance.

"We were essentially asked to not cut our hair and keep it in a turban," said Singh.

The local engineer is of the Sikh faith and says since 9-11, he's seen more people who aren't as accepting of his culture.

"There are very good people and there are some that don't understand," said Singh.

Last August, a Sikh truck driver went to a truck stop convenience store, where three men grabbed the turban from his head, ran around the building and into their car. Thanks to video surveillance, police were able to catch up with the group and arrest them.

A Douglas County jury indicted three Yoncalla residents for that crime on misdemeanor charges of theft and harassment, but not on the felony charge of intimidation.

"It's the same thing as going up to a woman and pulling her shirt off," said Eugene resident Sarib Khalsa.

Khalsa is also Sikh. He says the Yoncalla incident should be considered a hate crime.

"A turban to a Sikh is part of their identity. Historically even touching someone's turban is a huge insult," said Khalsa.

Oregon law classifies hate crimes as "intimidation" and defines the act as tampering or interfering with property, and causing substantial inconvenience to another because of the person's race, color, religion, national origin or sexual orientation.

So what can be done? One Sikh doctor living in Eugene says plenty.

"Education is the key to get rid of biases," said Jaswinder Kaur.
Click here to find out more! [Link]

Three men accused of snatching the turban off the head a Sikh truck driver have been accused of third-degree theft and misdemeanor harassment. The Douglas County grand jury declined to indict the men on a felony charge of intimidation.

Ryan Robbins, 21, Kyle Simmons, 22, and Ryan Newell, 28, all of Yoncalla, are accused in the Aug. 25 incident that occurred as Ranjit Singh left a truck stop convenience store, according to court records.

One of the men grabbed the turban, ran around the building, then drove away with it, the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office said. Investigators, with the help of a store surveillance video, found their suspects several days later.

The felony charge of intimidation deals with threats or assaults committed due to the perception of a person’s race, color, religion, national origin or sexual orientation.

Singh, 37, of Manteca, Calif., contacted the New York-based Sikh Coalition after the incident. The group considered the theft a hate crime and were disappointed with the grand jury’s decision on the intimidation charge.

Amardeep Singh, the executive director of the Sikh Coalition (no relation to Ranjit Singh), said the jurors apparently viewed the man who took the turban as “a prankster, but not a bigot.”

“It doesn’t seem that the grand jury got the injury to a whole community that occurs when you go after its most sacred article of faith,” he told the News-Review newspaper of Roseburg.

Said Rick Wesenberg, the assistant district attorney in Douglas County: “We presented the grand jury with the facts and the law, and the grand jury made the ultimate decision.”

The suspects could not immediately be reached for comment. Robbins’ attorney could also not be reached, according to the newspaper, and it was unclear whether the other two men have retained attorneys.

Ranjit Singh said he was troubled that the dollar value of his turban came up for debate during the grand jury process — to determine which level of theft should be charged. He says the turban is priceless.

“I’m not fighting for four or five dollars,” he said. “I am fighting for justice.” [Link]

Charged with bias intimidation and harassment

A woman was arrested early Wednesday and charged with trying to rip the turban off a Sikh man's head in a Washington Street bar.

"I went to the bar to place an order, and I realized that someone was trying to get my turban off my head," said 38-year-old Hansdip Singh Bindra, of Union City.

Bindra was reportedly at Madison Bar and Grill with a co-worker just after midnight.

"You're out for an evening with colleagues and this is the last thing you'd expect," he said.

Clutching the turban, which was nearly off, Bindra said he asked the woman if there was a problem.

Thirty-seven year-old Carrie Covello allegedly told Bindra to take off the turban because she "didn't like it."

Bindra says he alerted the bouncer, who called police. Covello was subsequently arrested.

At the precinct, police say Covello admitted touching the turban, but told cops she was only joking and didn't mean anything by it

Covello was charged with bias intimidation and harassment, which can lead to penalties ranging from probation to up to 18 months prison. [Link]

An investigation has been launched after a Sikh man was racially abused by a gang on a bus in Edinburgh.

The incident took place on a number 26 LRT bus travelling to Corstorphine, at about 2230 GMT on Saturday.

The 22-year-old victim, who wears a turban, boarded the bus at Haymarket with a friend.

Shortly after, a group of youths, who are all in their teens, racially abused the victim, partly due to his traditional clothing.

They then got off the bus at various stops along Corstorphine Road and Drum Brae South.

The main abuser, who is female, got off the bus at the top of the hill of Drum Brae Drive near to the Fox Covert housing estate.

She is white, 16 to 20 years old, 5ft 8ins, of slim build, with blonde hair tied up in a ponytail. She was wearing a white jacket and grey jeans.

A police spokesman said: "The victim was left extremely upset as a result of this incident, which shows a lack of respect for the victim's faith.

"There is no place in society for religious or racial intolerance.

"We want anyone who witnessed the incident, or who knows the identity of any of the youths involved, to get in touch." [Link]

One of two University of South Florida students accused of transporting explosives has asked the courts to throw out evidence against him, saying the search was racially motivated and illegal.

Students Ahmed Mohamed and Youssef Megahed were arrested Aug. 4 after deputies in South Carolina found explosive materials in their car trunk, authorities said. Both remain in federal custody awaiting trial.

In a court document filed Friday, Assistant Federal Public Defender James W. Smith, one of Megahed's attorneys, wrote that the South Carolina deputy who pulled the students over used racial slurs, did not believe the reasonable stories they gave and searched their car without probable cause.

Megahed and Mohamed were stopped for speeding. While in Berkeley County, S.C., sheriff's deputy Lamar Blakely radioed a dispatcher to look up Mohamed's driver's license and registration information and had a conversation with his partner, the court document states.

In that conversation, captured on videotape, Blakely tells his partner Mohamed and Megahed are "graduates of suicide bomber school" and members of the "Taliban," according to the court filing. He also jokes that they have a copy of the Quran with them. At one point, the court document states, Blakely becomes concerned the remarks are being taped.

Even though the driver's license and registration came back clean and neither man had an outstanding warrant, Blakely told his partner he was going to search the car, the document states. [Link]

Police in this northern Idaho city are investigating a note left on a convenience store door as possible malicious harassment.

Security cameras show a man getting out of a car and leaving the note at 2:57 a.m. Thursday at Piggie's Deli and Market.

Workers discovered the note tucked between the front doors when they opened at 5 a.m. The note contained a picture of a man wearing a sombrero and a slur against Latinos, and included the words, "Join the White Revolution," police said.

A Latino man worked the previous night's shift.

"This is a very serious matter," the store's manager, Dharamjit Khehra, told The Spokesman-Review.

Coeur d'Alene police Sgt. Christie Wood said malicious harassment, a felony, is punishable by up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $5,000. Idaho law also allows victims of such activity to file civil suits for damages.

Khehra, a Sikh who wears a turban and beard, said he's been in the United States 13 years and has managed Piggie's three years. He said the note is the only racist incident he's encountered. [Link]

The U.S. Justice Department is looking into last month's allegations by a St. Petersburg Muslim girl that she was threatened and harassed by a classmate at Azalea Middle School.

In a letter to Pinellas school superintendent Clayton Wilcox, a lawyer for the department's Civil Rights Division said the agency learned of the girl's allegations through media reports and asked the district to provide information on the case.

The lawyer, Kym Davis Rogers, said the inquiry was preliminary. She could not be reached Friday for comment.

Laurie Dart, an attorney for the school district, said she was compiling the information collected during Pinellas' investigation, which has ended. She said she planned to send it to the Justice Department soon. The district received the letter Monday.

The girl, 11-year-old Hannah Chehab, alleged at a Nov. 12 news conference that a boy at Azalea pulled off her headscarf, called a hijab, and later threatened to shoot and kill her after she complained to an assistant principal. She and her parents alleged that school officials were slow to respond to the incidents.

The sixth-grader also said the school year began with students asking her if she was a terrorist and if she was hiding a bomb. [Link]

Simranjeet Singh tried not to talk about the sadness he felt learning that his dad had been hospitalized by a man police say was intoxicated and committed what is being called a hate crime in a freeway assault Saturday.

Singh stuck to brief comments Wednesday night when pressed in front of TV cameras. The 17-year-old's hands fidgeted as he stood in front of more than 300 members of the local Sikh community who had gathered for a candlelight vigil, thanking them for their support.

His dad, taxicab driver Sukhvir Singh, was allegedly called a terrorist during an attack that left bite marks, a concussion and hair ripped from his scalp.

"Our religion teaches us to forgive," Simranjeet Singh said.

Not everybody who prayed for the taxi driver Wednesday night at Gurdwara Singh Sabha of Washington knew the man, who police say had been beaten after picking up a man kicked out of Saturday's Apple Cup.

But many knew the fear they say he felt.

Earlier this month, Yellow Cab driver Baltej Singh, who is not related to the victim, said a man began assaulting him while driving on state Route 520.

There have been several nights when he won't press customers for payment because they've been threatening or unstable, he said, and last weekend, a man refused to pay a fellow cabdriver after threatening him at gunpoint.

Racial slurs are spewed by customers each weekend, Baltej Singh added, and physical attacks aren't uncommon.

"This time," he said at the vigil, "it was the worst." [Link]

Two days after the Sept. 11 attacks, Swaranjit Singh was walking along Rockaway Boulevard in Queens when a young girl approached him and asked if he was going to bomb the neighborhood.

Someone then drove by and admonished the girl for speaking with Singh, a Bayside real estate agent who is Sikh and wears a turban, saying he was a "bad man," Singh recounted at a conference yesterday about hate crimes. Later that day, police stopped him as he walked to ask him what he was doing, and another driver made an obscene gesture at him.

Singh's painful personal stories of ignorance were among dozens shared by residents across New York as part of efforts to shed light on an uptick in hate crimes citywide over the past year.

"Ignorance creates fear and fear creates hatred," Singh said during a forum with Holocaust survivors at Queensborough Community College in Bayside. [Link]

Last week, 11-year-old Hannah Chehab alleged that a boy at Azalea ripped off her hijab and threatened to kill her. Pinellas County school officials said this week that they are investigating the complaint and how administrators responded amid contradictory details.

The incident underscores the delicate, often complex decision Muslim women make in deciding whether to don the hijab. Hannah's plight has many bay area Muslim women and their daughters talking about the hijab. Ultimately, they say, it is an individual decision.

They realize it can make them targets. [Link]

hree Muslim former employees of the Exxon Mobil gas station on I-95 in Delaware have filed a $12 million federal civil rights suit against the petroleum giant, alleging discrimination, harassment and retaliation.

The suit charges that the three Delaware residents – Sofiene Romdhani, Michelle Maloney and Bobbi Joe Zeller – were targeted by superiors because of their religion at the company-owned and -operated service station at the Delaware rest stop near Newark; that they were refused reasonable accommodations to take off for religious observances and mocked for their faith; and that Exxon Mobil officials ignored their repeated complaints.

“As an equal-opportunity employer, Exxon Mobil is committed to providing a work environment that fosters mutual employee respect and working relationships which are positive and productive,” said Beth Snyder, public affairs adviser for Exxon Mobil.

According to one of the plaintiffs, a regional manager told them, "I'm not here to accommodate your religious beliefs. I am running a business, not a religious community … I don't have to do anything … I'll get each and every one of you out of here."

The Tunisian-born Romdhani, 30, an Arab Muslim who had been manager of the station, claims that the harassment began after his regional manager found out about his ethnic heritage. Later, unlike other station managers, he was required to work seven days a week by this supervisor, the suit says.

Romdhani also charges the regional manager conspired to blame him for mistakes made by others, lied about his performance, undermined his authority as manager by repeatedly and publicly overruling him, denied him a standard salary increase and refused to allow him time off to attend Friday prayers.

He also claims the regional manager mocked his accent and goaded him to resign if he didn't like it, which he ultimately did in the fall of 2006, after working there for three years.

He said Exxon Mobil did nothing to investigate his claims of discrimination, and his charges were later verified by an investigation by the Delaware Department of Labor.

The two female plaintiffs, Zeller, 29, and Maloney, 28, both converted to Islam during the course of their employment at the service station and both alleged that the discriminatory behavior began shortly thereafter.

They both charge that the regional manager told them after Romdhani's departure he was going to "clean house of the people of Sofiene's kind."

The women said they were taunted by both managers and other employees at the station for their religion – one time finding the word "Terrorist" and other profanity scrawled in the cashier's booth where they worked.

Both also allege that management not only refused to make minor accommodations for their faith but ordered them to do things in direct opposition to Islam, like cleaning men's bathrooms.

The women said their complaints to the company were ignored, and Maloney, in the suit, said she felt she had no choice but to resign in August 2007.

Around that time, Zeller claims to have encountered the manager who replaced Romdhani openly reading pornographic magazines in the office. She said in the suit she complained and was fired that same day by the manager for “tardiness.”

The two women also filed charges with the Delaware Department of Labor, but according to the suit, both claims are still being processed.

The suit was filed by the Washington, D.C., firm of Katz, Marshall & Banks with the Wilmington firm of Martin & Wilson as local counsel. The three also worked with the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, which is supporting the group in their claims.

“Discrimination should not be tolerated in any environment, and those who engage in such unlawful action ... must be held accountable in a court of law,” said Kareem Shora, national executive director of the committee. [Link]

Local Sikh American community and SALDEF work together to secure apology

esterday, the Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund (SALDEF), the nation’s oldest and largest Sikh American civil rights and advocacy organization, received a formal apology from Mr. Jaipal Reddy, Chairman and CEO of Radio Salaam Namaste in response to complaints from the Sikh American community in Texas and a letter from SALDEF.

On the evening of October 6, 2007, Radio Salaam Namaste DJ’s Sadat and Talha made several jokes and disparaging remarks about ‘Sardars’ (male members of the Sikh faith). They then encouraged listeners to call-in to the station with more jokes about members of the Sikh faith.

“Your comments demonstrate a significant lack of judgment and professionalism and perpetuate an extremely hurtful and demeaning stereotype about members of the Sikh faith. [Additionally] such stereotypes not only directly affect Sikh American listeners, but also color the perceptions of your listeners and affect their relationships with members of the Sikh American community,” wrote SALDEF to the DJs and station management. [SALDEF Press Release]

I'm 23 and have been a Dallas Cowboys fan since I was six.

I was fortunate enough to attend the Monday night game against the Bills. The atmosphere was incredible. There were a lot of Cowboys fans, but Bills fans voiced their opinions to every one of us in Dallas jerseys.

I watched a documentary on two Sikh fans who went to a Browns game in Cleveland and were ridiculed for the way they looked because of their religion. I'm also a Sikh (East-Indian background), and I went to the game with two other Sikhs, one of whom was wearing a turban.

We expected comments with regards to our religion, but the only ridicule we faced was for being Cowboys fans.

I have new respect for Bills fans. They were unbelievably passionate about their team, and I loved it.

I appreciate going to a game, and expressing my views without being stared at by everyone in my section like I'm some sort of illiterate person, with no etiquette. [Link]