Optometrist Charged With Allegedly Delivering Nooses, Making Racist Threats (over BLM accessories)
A criminal complaint filed against Pilon on Tuesday detailed six counts of "willfully intimidating and attempting to intimidate citizens from engaging in lawful speech and protests." Each misdemeanor charge is punishable with a fine and up to one year in prison.
Pilon's alleged threats began on June 14, 2020, according to the complaint. He was accused of calling nine Starbucks stores across Michigan between 4:39 pm and 5:42 pm that day. In just over an hour, he allegedly directed nine staffers who picked up the phones to "Tell all the Starbucks workers wearing BLM shirts that the only good n***er is a dead n***er."
Pilon also allegedly told one of the employees, "I'm gonna go out and lynch me a n***er."
Two days earlier, Starbucks had announced that it was providing 250,000 "Black Lives Matter" T-shirts to employees who wanted to share their support for the movement during their shifts.
On June 22, Pilon allegedly left a noose in the parking lot of a Goodwill in Saginaw, Michigan. Attached to it was a handwritten note that said, "An accessory to be worn with your 'BLM' t-shirt. Happy Protesting!" He allegedly continued to leave nooses with similar notes at a 7-Eleven, a Walmart and a Kroger store over the following month.
Pilon also allegedly slipped a noose with an identical note into a truck owned by a Saginaw couple, prosecutors said. MLive identified the couple as Donald Simon, who is Black, and Regina Simon, who is Mexican-white. Regina told the outlet that she had been wearing a Black Lives Matter shirt while playing with the family dog in her front yard on July 11, the day before they discovered Pilon's threat.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/optometrist-charged-with-allegedly-delivering-nooses-making-racist-threats/ar-AAWFFiw
