Man set free after setting Asian students on fire.

[Sympthsical]

I know people don't care about anti-AAPI stuff unless it can be pinned on Trump, but as someone with a lot of AAPI nieces and nephews, the anti-Asian environment in the Bay Area bothers me. And it bothers me more when my own side seems studiously and concretely set on ignoring it.

A man who was found guilty of lighting UC Berkeley students on fire at a boba shop near the Cal campus in 2020 has been released from custody without prison time or probation after agreeing to participate in a diversion program for veterans, court records show.

In late April, according to records reviewed by The Berkeley Scanner, Brandon McGlone was convicted of multiple felonies in connection with the boba shop attack as well as felony assault and gun charges from a separate domestic violence case.

https://www.berkeleyscanner.com/2023/05/20/uc-berkeley-crime/berkeley-boba-shop-attack-man-released-diversion-program/

[marble falls]

1. It feels like he has a ready defense for the next time.

[dalton99a]

2. Seems they bent over backwards and sideways to coddle a violent psychopath

similar to what happened in S.F.

[progressoid]

20. Indeed. n/t

[hlthe2b]

3. I had to go to the very end of the article to find that the students survived and were not seriously

injured. This is a horrific hate crime, but you'd think the article would make it clear that the students were not killed--not as an after-thought at the end of the article.

I assume that fact and the assailant's history as a veteran earned him leniency, but I hope he is monitored closely and gets psych care. I hate to think how more "successful" he might be next time.

[Elessar Zappa]

4. Apparently you weren't here or don't remember

that there was tons of discussion on this website of the anti-Asian violence that occurred during the first part of the pandemic.

[Hekate]

5. This

[Sympthsical]

7. It's literally the first sentence of the OP

"I know people don't care about anti-AAPI stuff unless it can be pinned on Trump"

Once he was gone, so did caring about it (and caring about it lasted maybe a month at best).

Let's not dislocate any shoulders here.

[dpibel]

11. That man!

I think he is made of straw.

Let's not dislocate any broad-brush, unsupported allegations here.

[BlackSkimmer]

13. Certainly not unsupported. Not in the least. nt

[dpibel]

19. So I should just take your word for it?

I read this website pretty thoroughly.

And yet I've missed this awful thing you and the OP see.

So, heck. Offer some support. You say it's there.

I say that there's plenty of concern about oppression here, regardless of the specific type.

There are also a few people, pretty much on any topic, who will whitesplain or gunsplain or mansplain or straightsplain.

But you want to claim that the outliers represent the whole?

I beg to differ.

[Haggis 4 Breakfast]

6. How in the hell is this not attempted first degree murder ?

[ProfessorGAC]

8. Same Question

There was an obvious attempt to do harm using deadly means.
Seems it's being treated as a minor offense.

[electric_blue68]

9. Yikes! I missed hearing about this. That seems awfully lieniant.

A program...? He could go and try something again before that even has a chance to work.

[BlackSkimmer]

16. He also has felony domestic charges for pistol whipping his wife.

Numerous other offenses.

I'd dearly love to know this guy's military record, length of service, etc.

[TomSlick]

10. I don't understand the statement DUers

"don't care about anti-AAPI stuff unless it can be pinned on Trump."

I am prepared to assume that DUers very much care about hate crimes, whether or not they can be traced back to Trump.

[BlackSkimmer]

14. You've missed some threads.

And we've all missed some threads that were never posted or sank fast, depending on the perpetrators of those hate crimes.

A simple search will show you how those threads went.

[TomSlick]

21. I think we are agreeing.

I was questioning the statement in the OP.

[Ex Lurker]

23. The implication is DUers look the other way when it's a POC accused of a crime

and that implication is a racist dogwhistle.

[Ace Rothstein]

12. I'm so tired of the coddling of violent criminals.

They show over and over again why they are unable to love peacefully among the rest of society. I will never vote for a progressive DA or judge.

[Zipgun]

15. I think a residential treatment program would be more

Appropriate. I’m convinced that jail would serve no one and putting severely mentally ill people in jail is disastrous. Yet we do it all the time. But he is obviously a danger to himself and others and needs serious intervention

[LudwigPastorius]

17. So,...

this guy had a homemade flamethrower, molotov cocktails, a knife, and an axe, and he doesn't get locked up?

I'm all for him getting any mental health treatment he needs, but he's fucking dangerous and needs to be removed from society.

[WarGamer]

18. Agreed and I'd like to chip in.

I've worked for years around Chinese folks... while living IN CHINA.

I've worked domestically with Asian professionals from Singapore, Japan, Korea... all over.

They're loyal friends, value tight families, expect a lot from their children and love the USA.

anti-AAPI bias isn't publicized enough.

[Moosepoop]

22. As horrific as this crime was, I don't see the anti-AAPI connection.

The attacks started outside a pizza place, then a Taco Bell Cantina, then finally the boba shop. The victims were apparently chosen by proximity to the attacker, not by race. His verbal ramblings throughout had to do with his family, not the race of the victims.

Inside the boba shop, he stepped inside the door and sprayed the people closest to him, that he could reach with the spray. The two that got ignited are Asian. But there were others who were sprayed as well, just lucky enough to not have had a fireball hit them, and they have names like Ellinor Arzbaecher and Benjamin Weinberger.

This guy was deranged and homicidal, but not anti-AAPI. He was anti-everyone.

[rictofen]

24. But the real problem was their behavior after being set on fire

[XanaDUer2]

25. Kick nt