The 20-year-old San Francisco man arrested following the February 22 attack on a 68-year-old Asian man — and the one who recorded the incident on his cellphone and can apparently be heard saying "I hate Asians" — will not be charged with a crime, as the District Attorney's office announced Monday.
Alex Bastian, a spokesman for the DA's office, tells ABC 7 that they will instead be seeking "restorative justice" in the case of Hunters Point resident Dwayne Grayson, who was arrested by the SFPD last Thursday. The case was being investigated as a possible hate crime.
According to Bastian, conversations with the victim led DA Chesa Boudin to seek restorative justice — which is commonly known as the process of seeking rehabilitation for offenders through reconciliation with victims and the community.
Here was Grayson's video:
please share this with your friends & family. this is so low, the older man was just trying to make ends meet for his family. he didn’t deserve this. this is ignorant, inhumane, & sickening. i’m praying for this man and his family. if you have any information, please reach out. pic.twitter.com/545xHFwPm4
— nikc (@nicholaaasli) February 24, 2020
A second suspect, 56-year-old Jonathan Amerson, turned himself in to police at Bayview Station on Sunday morning, and he was booked on suspicion of two counts of robbery and two counts of elder abuse. Amerson is allegedly the person in the video who can be seen stealing the cart of recyclables from the Asian man and subsequently threatening him and striking him in the back of the head.
It remains unclear what charges, if any, Amerson will face.
Mayor London Breed and Supervisor Shamann Walton, who represents Hunters Point, held a "Community Unity and Healing Rally" last week at the housing complex where the incident took place, as Bay City News reports.
Related: Disgusting Twitter Video Shows Apparent Bayview Robbery, Black-on-Asian Racism
