TEXAS: DALLAS Seven counts of aggravated assault have been brought against the guy, known as Jeremy Smith, who is accused of shooting three Asian ladies at a salon in Dallas’ Koreatown. According to sources, each offence carries a sentence of five to 99 years in jail.
At the Hair World Salon in the Koreatown neighborhood of northwest Dallas on May 11, Smith, 37, is suspected of shooting three women of Korean descent, including the salon owner, a stylist, and a client. According to the arrest warrant affidavit, the shooter shot the victims with a 0.22-caliber rifle roughly 13 times, according to NBC. Following hospitalization for gunshot wounds, the women were released. According to CBS, Smith was detained with a $700K bail after being nabbed by Dallas police on May 16. According to a report by the AP, the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office announced the indictment on Tuesday, August 9, which included seven counts of aggravated assault with a dangerous weapon, each with a hate-crime enhancement and carrying a sentence of five to 99 years in prison. Smith is believed to have chosen the complainants on purpose due to his bigotry or prejudice against Asian Americans, it read.
According to an earlier AP article, Smith’s fiancée reportedly informed authorities that he had been having delusions about Asian Americans since since he was involved in a car accident with a man of Asian heritage two years ago. She claimed that due to the delusions, he had been admitted to many mental health facilities. He starts believing that the Asian mob is chasing him or trying to hurt him, the woman claimed. She also mentioned that he lost his job as a result of verbally abusing his Asian-American supervisor.
After the incident, Smith was seen on security footage racing back to his four-wheeler, a Honda Odyssey minivan, carrying a “assault-style gun.” Police are currently looking into the incident.
According to AP, six of the eight people slain in a shooting at massage parlors in and around Atlanta in 2021 were women of Asian ethnicity. Jose Gomez III, a 21-year-old Texas man, was given a 25-year prison sentence for beating an Asian family in 2020 because he believed they were Chinese and to blame for the Covid-19 pandemic.
A nonprofit organization in California called the Asian American-Pacific Islander Equity Alliance has compiled reports of 10,370 hate crimes that occurred between March 2020 and September 2021. The study displayed data on hate crimes, including 4,599 cases from 2020 and 5,771 cases from 2021.