When Jason and Jeramie stepped outside their home early Saturday morning, they had difficulty comprehending the messages scratched onto the car they’d recently had beautifully painted and detailed: Words like “fags” and “homos” and “bitches move” – had been etched through their car’s new finish, deep into the metal.
“It was hideous,” 33-year-old Jason said of the vandalism that destroyed the car’s exterior.
“It was over every square inch of the car – so deep that it was basically engraved.”
Redding Police estimate that the car was vandalized between 3 and 5 a.m. Saturday, just a few days after the couple had brought their car home from the repair shop.
Jason, who asked that neither his nor his 32-year-old partner’s last names be used here, said Saturday’s event was not the first time they’ve been harassed since they moved to their south Redding neighborhood.
Days earlier their rental truck had been keyed while their car was in the shop. And months before, shortly after the men’s October wedding, they were the victims of a bogus tip to the police – that their home contained a large cache of weapons.
And although the call proved to be false, and although the police later apologized for the mistake, until then, the night the couple still refers to as the “shotgun incident” is a nightmare of an evening they say they’ll never forget.
“There were about 15 or 16 cops,” Jason recalled. “They had the roads blocked with their cars, they had machine guns, and they were screaming for us to get down on our knees and lay face down. It was terrifying.”
Jason said the police searched their house that night and found no guns. He said the police also quickly determined that neither man had a criminal record. Other false accusations followed that one in the fall, but law enforcement no longer took the calls seriously.
“The police have gotten to know that we’re the victims,” Jason said.
Jason said that when the police were called to their home Saturday, the Redding officer who responded assured the couple that the Redding Police Department doesn’t stand for hate crimes, and the RPD would do the very best it could to solve the case.
Monday afternoon Redding police Cpl. Aaron Maready reiterated that sentiment. He said the incident was reported as a hate crime and is under investigation.
He said no suspects had been identified – news that disappointed Jason.
“I was hoping they had suspects,” he said.
“We’re still in fear now. It makes us quite nervous, and it’s disheartening to think it’s possible that nobody will be held accountable.”
Jason, who was raised in Redding and returned a few years ago, said that If anything, every time a hate crime is committed without prosecution it only reaffirms a common belief among victims.
“We know several people in our gay community who’ve not reported (hate crimes),” he said. “They are afraid it will be ignored, or laughed at. We know one person who was physically attacked, and someone else whose brand new truck was kicked in.”
Many times since Saturday Jason and Jeramie have reflected upon the fact that July 1 is the 10th anniversary of the hate crimes that killed Gary Matson and Winfield Mowder, a beloved Happy Valley gay couple – friends to many of us – murdered in their bed by a pair of white supremacist brothers who’d also torched three Sacramento synagogues.
Jason said the reason he shared his story with us was he felt it important that people who live here know that hate crimes still occur in the north state, much more often than we realize.
Tom O’Mara, on behalf of Shasta County Citizens Against Racism, said he understood some victims’ reluctance to report hate crimes. But he also said that if anything, the timing of this week’s incident against a gay couple only underscores the importance of reporting hate crimes.
“While this July 1 marks the 10th anniversary of the slayings of Gary Matson and Winfield Mowder, July 4th marks the 233rd birthday of this country,” O’Mara said.
“It’s a country which began with the words, ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.’ To those who would commit hate crimes I ask: What part of equal do you not understand? To those who would defend and express reverence for the rights outlined above, it remains essential for us to be vigilant, to proudly defend those whose rights are infringed upon, and to seek justice for everyone who is victimized in this way. To do less makes the Fourth of July something of a hollow ceremony.”
Meanwhile, Jason and Jeramie are so rattled by what’s happened that they’re considering staying elsewhere for a while.
“To be honest, we’re all afraid,” he said Tuesday.
“Tomorrow is the anniversary of the gay guys who were killed. We don’t know where the people who did this to our car will take it next. We’re scared.”
