June 29, 2009 9:07 AM
Back on June 13, we blogged about an alleged hate crime in Medford, where an Ecuadorean family had trash dumped on their front lawn during the night, and where some of the trash—which included condoms, tampons, and a shredded SAT book—had anti-Latino epithets scrawled on it. While the Suffolk County Police Department is still investigating the incident as a hate crime, a source within the department said that the crime was likely committed by youths as a prank, and not necessarily with a greater racial motivation. We'll keep you posted on this as it develops.
A few days after the trash dumping, I went out to that Medford neighborhood and asked locals what they thought about the crime—specifically the anti-Latino aspect of it—and whether the act was representative of their community or tensions between immigrants and more established residents.
The majority of neighbors didn't think there was a strong anti-Latino or anti-immigrant sentiment in the neighborhood, and condemned the act, no matter what its intent. "We've got a mixed bag, all races here, and everybody seems to get along." said Ron Grippi, a 48-year-old convenience store owner who lives in the Medford neighborhood where the incident occurred. "It was probably just a prank or something." Others reiterated his thoughts, and stressed the quiet, comfortable feel of the area.
A few people talked of tensions, though. Paul Felice, a 17-year-old incoming senior at Patchogue-Medford High School, said that some kids in the area seem biased against people different than themselves, even if that's not how he and his friends behave. He recalled an incident a few years ago where his father, of Turkish descent, had suffered similar vandalism. "I guess the people found out, and they spray-painted a bunch of racist remarks on his car," Felice said.
Another of Felice's friends likened a nearby playground to a prison yard, where white, black, and Latino kids all hang out in separate groups. However, when I took a walk down to park, all I found were a half dozen teenage boys—both Hispanic and non-Hispanic white—horsing around on the blacktop.
Frances Poyner, a 75-year-old unemployed legal secretary who also lives in the neighborhood, linked the trash incident, along with other ethnically based bias crimes, to current immigration policy. When government rhetoric divides immigrants by legal and illegal status, tensions are bound to increase, she said.
"They need to straighten this immigration problem out," Poyner said (shown above). "The illegals, legalize them. Let them pay taxes, so they could work, and then we wouldn't have all these problems." Poyner, whose parents are Puerto Rican, said that the issue wasn't just limited to Hispanics because there were immigrants in her community from many different backgrounds. "All this [immigration] nonsense," she said. "It all mushrooms."
(Photo by Ted Hesson)