Credit
Zach D. Roberts, via Associated Press
The
police arrested two men, including a member of the Ku Klux Klan, and
were seeking a third in connection with violent episodes that took place
at the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Va., this month,
including the beating of an African-American man that was caught on video and widely shared on social media.
The
arrests came two weeks after the Aug. 12 rally, which brought hundreds
of white supremacists to Charlottesville to protest the removal of a
statue of Robert E. Lee, the Confederate general. The day was marked by
skirmishes between demonstrators and counterprotesters, and a
32-year-old woman, Heather D. Heyer, was struck and killed by a car in
what the authorities have called a terrorist attack.
The police were widely criticized for not doing more to stop violence throughout the morning.
The
beating victim, DeAndre Harris, 20, was cornered in a parking garage
just yards from Police Headquarters, where he was attacked by six men
who had gathered for the rally. Mr. Harris has a broken wrist and
sustained a head injury that required 10 staples, his lawyer, S. Lee
Merritt, said.
Daniel P. Borden, 18, was charged with malicious wounding
in connection with the aggravated assault on Mr. Harris, the police
said. He was arrested Friday and was being held at the Hamilton County
Justice Center in Cincinnati, the Charlottesville police said in a
statement.
The
authorities also released a wanted poster for Alex Michael Ramos, 33,
of Marietta, Ga. He was also charged with malicious wounding, a felony
punishable by one to five years in prison.
“For
DeAndre and his family, news of the arrest of one of the six men that
assaulted him comes five suspects short and 14 days too late,” Mr.
Merritt said Saturday. “Given that these men were identified by a
journalist almost immediately, it appears that law enforcement sat on
its hands for a couple of weeks before deciding they probably should
arrest someone.”
Mr.
Merritt said the suspects were identified as a result of efforts by
Shaun King, an activist and a columnist at The Daily News in New York,
who issued a $10,000 reward for information that led to arrests.
According
to Mr. Merritt, Mr. Ramos’s friends identified him after he posted
about the attack on Facebook, saying that as a Puerto Rican man he
disavowed white supremacy but participated in the rally because he
despises leftists. In the video, Mr. Ramos appeared to have something
wrapped in his hands that he used to strike Mr. Harris, Mr. Merritt
said.
The
attack started because white supremacists had tried to “spear” one of
Mr. Harris’s friends with a flagpole, and Mr. Harris tried to knock the
pole away, the lawyer said. Suddenly Mr. Harris, an aspiring rapper, was
rushed by more than a dozen men and fell backward. The video showed Mr.
Harris on the ground being pummeled.
The
police also made an arrest Saturday in connection with an earlier
incident at the rally, in which a man was captured on video shooting at
the ground in the direction of an African-American counterprotester. The
counterprotester, Corey Long, was the friend Mr. Harris would go on to
defend in the parking garage a few hours later, Mr. Merritt said.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia submitted the video to the F.B.I. and the local police.
“At first it was peaceful protest,” Mr. Long told The Root,
a black news and culture website. “Until someone pointed a gun at my
head. Then the same person pointed it at my foot and shot the ground.”
Photos showed that Mr. Long had been using an improvised torch to spar with a man carrying a flagpole when the shot was fired.
Richard W. Preston, 52, was charged with discharging a firearm
within 1,000 feet of a school, a crime punishable by two to 10 years in
prison. He was arrested Saturday and is in the custody of the Baltimore
County Detention Center in Towson, Md., the police said.
Mr. Preston is an imperial wizard in the Ku Klux Klan, according to numerous news reports. “We didn’t go as the Klan,”
Mr. Preston told an Indiana TV station shortly after the rally. “We
didn’t go there to create havoc and fight. We went there to protect a
monument.”
In
a statement released Saturday, the police said investigators had
identified 35 victims of the car attack that killed Ms. Heyer. James Alex Fields Jr.,
20, of Maumee, Ohio, who the authorities say drove the car, has been
charged with killing Ms. Heyer and wounding numerous other people in a
crowd.
“At
this time, our detectives have identified 35 victims and have reached
out to each of them. We are still awaiting a response from several
victims,” police said. “This is an ongoing investigation, with multiple
victims, witnesses and items of evidence.”
The police asked anyone with information on Mr. Ramos’s whereabouts to call (434) 970-3280.
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