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To Honor Marcelo Lucero, a Blood Drive in Patchogue (VIDEO)

Posted November 9, 2010 by Ted Hesson
Categories: Suffolk

On the two-year anniversary of the death of Ecuadorian immigrant Marcelo Lucero, who was attacked and stabbed in a November 2008 hate crime, upwards of two dozen community members gathered at Patchogue Village Hall to give blood in his name last night. The event, organized by the Long Island Immigrant Alliance, came a day after a vigil for Lucero was held near the Patchogue train station.

The memory of the Lucero attack serves as a reminder for the need to heal social divides, according to Luis Valenzuela, the executive director of the Alliance and a member of the Long Island Wins steering committee.

“It’s Marcelo Lucero’s anniversary; he shed his blood on these streets,” Valenzuela said. “And what the community wanted to do is to make a powerful statement by giving their blood: that integration is what’s needed rather than division.”

Among the donors at the blood drive was Patchogue Village Mayor Paul Pontieri, who, before heading into the blood mobile outside of his office, stressed that the assailants who attacked Lucero came from outside of the village.

“This tragedy came to us,” Pontieri said. “We didn’t create it, it came to this community. These kids came because there were Latinos living in this community comfortably, and there were many living in this community comfortably. An easy place to find your targets.”

At the vigil on Sunday, Pontieri, speaking with a Spanish translator by his side, christened the spot where Lucero was attacked as “Unity Place.”