Hate crime against Indian American family in Colorado: dog feces on garage, 50 racial slurs posted, 40 eggs thrown

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A spate of hate attacks on the Indian and Indian American community is increasing in the US. In yet another horrific attack, an Indian American family’s home in Peyton, Colorado was vandalized on Sunday by unidentified perpetrators by smearing dog feces across the garage, peppering the home with about 40 eggs, and posting about 50 hate messages and racial slurs.

The FBI, which took over the case, is investigating the racist attack on the Indian American family as a hate crime. However, no suspects have yet been identified as yet, reported The Gazette.

The incident follows several alarming racist fliers by white supremacist groups targeting Indian families in several parts of Texas, and some communities in Norwalk, Connecticut. A long-time Indian American family’s car was vandalized in Missouri days after the Presidential elections, with an unidentified perpetrator scratching ‘Trump’ on the car.

Also, days before Christmas, an Indian American woman, Aravinda Pillalamarri, was detained by local law enforcement as she took a walk in her neighborhood in the Bel Air area of Maryland. Police asked her if she was in the country “illegally” and told that she was under “criminal investigation”. She’s a US citizen. Police converged on her after a neighbor complained to the police about a suspicious looking individual in the neighborhood.

KKTV talked to the homeowner in Colorado, who identified himself only by his first name: Saravanan. He said neighbors alerted him to the vandalism early Sunday morning. The El Paso County Sheriff’s Office said they were called to the home on White Sands Court about 7:30 a.m.

About 10 percent of the messages left behind were racial slurs, Saravanan told KKTV.

“‘You brown or Indian shouldn’t be here,’ something like that,” he paraphrased some of the estimated 50 signs posted to his home and vehicle. “So it was frightening.”

El Paso County property records show the home is owned by Saravanan Arunachalam, who bought the one-story ranch house in February 2015. Previously, he lived in Colorado Springs for 11 years, public records show, reported the Gazette.

Saravanan told KKTV, “I have no idea” why his family was targeted. He added the experience at his house has left his family shaken.

“No physical damage; that mental damage is there. It will be there … at least for a while,” he told KKTV in an on-camera interview in which he declined to have his face shown.

Despite the act of hate, Saravanan said his neighbors are showing support and compassion. Some came together Sunday to help clean his house, he told KKTV.

“It was a mixed message in on one side we see this kind of thing happening, and on the other side, we have really good people and helping us all the time,” Saravanan told KKTV. “I want to thank God for giving us good neighbors, and I hope this thing doesn’t continue in the future.”

Hate crimes are on the up in Colorado.

Following Trump’s election, a transgender woman in Denver found her car painted with a swastika and the words “DIE” and “TRUMP” and “FAG” among other insults. In Colorado Springs, the Cheyenne Mountain Junior High School principal sent parents a warning letter after a number of fights at the school involving a Jewish student and anti-Semitism, and a slew of racial and ethnic slurs.