Police chief's son arrested for assault on septuagenarian Sikh man in California

Agencies
August 9, 2018

New York, Aug 9: The son of a police chief in a Californian city is among two teenagers arrested and charged with attempted robbery and abuse of a 71-year-old Sikh man on Monday, the second attack on a minority community member in the US state within a week, authorities said.

The investigators are trying to determine if the attack was a hate crime.

Police arrested 18-year-old Tyrone McAllister and a 16-year-old male juvenile yesterday for the attack on Sahib Singh Natt on the side of a road early morning on August 6 in Manteca.

McAllister, the son of Union City Police Chief Darryl McAllister, and the juvenile have been charged with attempted robbery, elder abuse and assault with a deadly weapon.

The Manteca Police Department said it received numerous tips which assisted in the identification of the suspects.

Investigations Supervisor sergeant Miller said the public assistance in providing information with this case was instrumental in identifying the suspects and helped in making a quick arrest.

Meanwhile, McAllister's father posted a statement on the Facebook page of the Union City Police department saying he is "completely disgusted" to find out that one of the suspects in this "horrific crime" is his son.

He said his son has been "estranged" from his family and home for several months now.

"Words can barely describe how embarrassed, dejected, and hurt my wife, daughters, and I feel right now. Violence and hatred is not what we have taught our children; intolerance for others is not even in our vocabulary, let alone our values," the senior McAllister said in the statement.

He said it is difficult for his family to comprehend how one of his three kids, raised with the same values and character, wandered so far astray.

"In the eyes of the public, no matter the irrelevance to the incident, the fact remains that the father of the perpetrator of this despicable crime is a police chief, period," he said.

Disturbing footage from a surveillance camera shows Natt walking alone on the side of a road early morning on August 6 when two men, wearing hoodies, walking from the opposite direction approach him.

Natt stops on seeing the men and the duo are seen talking to him. Natt then walks past them but they continue to follow and talk with him.

After a brief argument, one of the men, who is wearing a black hoodie, suddenly kicks Natt in the stomach and the elderly man falls down on the road, with his turban coming off.

He tries to get up and defend himself but the man again kicks him in the stomach. Natt falls on the road as the man who attacked him comes close to him and appears to touch his face and spit on him. They then walk away as Natt is lying on the road.

A few seconds later the man in the black hoodie runs back and viciously kicks Natt three times near his head as he lay on the street. He then starts leaving again, pauses, turns around, and then spits at Natt.

The police chief said his "stomach has been churning" from the moment he learned the news of the attack on Natt and that his son was involved.

He also said his son began to lose his way a couple years ago, while he was a juvenile, running away and getting involved in a bad crowd.

"He got into trouble for some theft-related crimes and ended up spending several months in juvenile hall," the senior McAllister said, adding that his son was again arrested for a theft-related incident, and he ended up spending another three months in adult jail as a result.

"Since being released he has been wayward and has not returned to our family home for several months," he said.

The police chief said he and his wife worked with Manteca Police to help them track their son down and arrest him.

"He now faces serious felony charges...My family is shaken to the core," he said.

The attack on Natt is the second on a Sikh man within a week in California.

On July 31, 50-year-old Surjit Malhi was attacked while putting up campaign signs in support of incumbent Republican Congressman Jeff Denham and other local Republican candidates at Stanislaus County.

While beating Malhi, the attackers yelled "Go back to your country!" and spray painted the same message, along with hate symbols, on his truck.

Sikh advocacy group The Sikh Coalition has urged members of the community to remain vigilant and report cases of bias, bigotry and backlash in the wake of the attacks.

"We are deeply troubled by these two attacks and strongly encourage increased vigilance nationwide as we work to support the Central Valley, CA community during this difficult time," Sikh Coalition legal director Amrith Kaur said.

"If you or someone you know has experienced a potential hate crime, please reach out to our team. We have a seasoned team of lawyers who can provide free legal advice and support you through the process to protect your rights," she said.

The California chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-CA) also condemned the attack on Natt.

"We stand in solidarity with the Sikh community against the bigotry and racism that fuels hate crimes like this one nationwide. These kinds of incidents are becoming increasingly common under the Trump administration and are direct attacks on religious liberty in the US," CAIR-Sacramento Valley's executive director Basim Elkarra said.

In the past, CAIR had stood in solidarity with communities of various faiths and backgrounds that are subject to hate crimes.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
Agencies
June 28,2020

Paris, Jun 28: More than 10 million cases of the new coronavirus have been officially declared around the world, half of them in Europe and the United States, according to an AFP tally on Sunday based on official sources.

At least 10,003,942 infections, including 498,779 deaths, have been registered globally.

Europe remains the hardest hit continent with 2,637,546 cases including 195,975 fatalities, while the United States has 2,510,323 infections including 125,539 deaths.

The rate of infections worldwide continues to rise, with one million new cases recorded in just six days.

The tallies, using data collected by AFP from national authorities and information from the World Health Organization (WHO), probably reflect only a fraction of the actual number of infections.

Many countries are testing only symptomatic or the most serious cases and some do not have the capacity to carry out widescale testing.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
Agencies
July 28,2020

Kuala Lumpur, Jul 28: Malaysia's ex-leader Najib Razak was found guilty Tuesday in his first trial over the multi-billion-dollar 1MDB scandal, two years after the fraud contributed to the downfall of his long-ruling government.

The former prime minister could now face decades in jail after being convicted on all charges in the case related to the looting of sovereign wealth fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad.

Billions of dollars were stolen from the investment vehicle and spent on everything from high-end real estate to pricey art, while investment bank Goldman Sachs also became embroiled in the scandal.

Anger at the looting played a large part in the shock loss of Najib's long-ruling coalition in elections in 2018, and he was arrested and hit with dozens of charges following his defeat.

The verdict was a test of Malaysia's rule of law. It comes about five months after Najib's scandal-plagued party returned to power as part of a coalition, development observers had feared could affect the outcome of the case.

About 16 months after it began, the Kuala Lumpur High Court delivered the verdict in Najib's first trial, which centred on the transfer of 42 million ringgit ($9.9 million) from a former 1MDB unit, SRC International, into his accounts.

Najib had vehemently denied wrongdoing.

But Judge Mohamad Nazlan Mohamad Ghazali took apart all the arguments put forward by his defence, and found him guilty on the seven charges he faced.

"In conclusion, after considering all the evidence in this trial, I find the prosecution has successfully proven the case," the judge told the court.

The charges were one of abuse of power, three of criminal breach of trust and three of money-laundering.

The counts of abuse of power and criminal breach of trust are punishable by up to 20 years in jail each, while the money-laundering charges are punishable by up to 15 years each.

Sentencing was not handed down straight away. The 67-year-old will likely appeal and he may not be sent to jail immediately. If his conviction is upheld, he will also be barred from political office for several years.

Najib had insisted he was ignorant of the transactions.

The defence team portrayed Najib as a victim and instead sought to paint financier Low Taek Jho, a key figure in the scandal who has been charged in the US and Malaysia, as the mastermind.

Low, whose whereabouts are unknown, maintains his innocence.

Prosecutors insisted Najib was in control of the 1MDB unit, SRC International.

The return of Najib's party to power as part of a coalition in March followed the collapse of Mahathir Mohamad's reformist administration.

Since then, 1MDB-linked charges were unexpectedly dropped against the ex-leader's stepson Riza Aziz, a producer of Hollywood movie "The Wolf of Wall Street", in exchange for him agreeing to return assets to Malaysia.

Prosecutors also dropped dozens of charges against Najib ally Musa Aman, the former leader of Sabah state.

The amounts involved in Najib's first case are small compared to those in his second and most significant trial, which centres on allegations he illicitly obtained more than $500 million.

Malaysia had charged Goldman Sachs and some current and former staff, claiming large amounts were stolen when the bank arranged bond issues for 1MDB.

But the two sides agreed to a $3.9 billion settlement last week in exchange for charges being dropped.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
May 5,2020

May 5: Global coronavirus deaths reached 250,000 on Monday after recorded infections topped 3.5 million, a news agency tally of official government data showed, although the rate of fatalities has slowed.

North America and European countries accounted for most of the new deaths and cases reported in recent days, but numbers were rising from smaller bases in Latin America, Africa and Russia.

Globally, there were 3,062 new deaths and 61,923 new cases over the past 24 hours, taking total cases to 3.58 million.

That easily exceeds the estimated 140,000 deaths worldwide in 2018 caused by measles, and compares with around 3 million to 5 million cases of severe illness caused annually by seasonal influenza, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

While the current trajectory of COVID-19 falls far short of the 1918 Spanish flu, which infected an estimated 500 million people, killing at least 10% of patients, experts worry the available data is underplaying the true impact of the pandemic.

The concerns come as several countries begin to ease strict lockdowns that have been credited with helping contain the spread of the virus.

"We could easily have a second or a third wave because a lot of places aren't immune," Peter Collignon, an infectious diseases physician and microbiologist at Canberra Hospital, told Reuters. He noted the world was well short of herd immunity, which requires around 60% of the population to have recovered from the disease.

The first death linked to COVID-19 was reported on Jan. 10 in Wuhan, China after the coronavirus first emerged there in December. Global fatalities grew at a rate of 1-2% in recent days, down from 14% on March 21, according to the Reuters data.

DEATH RATE ANOMALIES

Mortality rates from recorded infections vary greatly from country to country.

Collignon said any country with a mortality rate of more than 2% almost certainly had underreported case numbers. Health experts fear those ratios could worsen in regions and countries less prepared to deal with the health crisis.

"If your mortality rate is higher than 2%, you've missed a lot of cases," he said, noting that countries overwhelmed by the outbreak were less likely to conduct testing in the community and record deaths outside of hospitals.

In the United States, around half the country's state governors partially reopened their economies over the weekend, while others, including New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, declared the move was premature.

In Britain, Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who battled COVID-19 last month, has said the country was over the peak but it was still too early to relax lockdown measures.

Even in countries where the suppression of the disease has been considered successful, such as Australia and New Zealand which have recorded low daily rates of new infections for weeks, officials have been cautious.

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has predicated a full lifting of curbs on widespread public adoption of a mobile phone tracking app and increased testing levels.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.