December 2008

After Marcelo Lucero's tragic death in Long Island in early November, LatinoJustice PRLDEF launched an investigation into the matter. Our outreach to members of the community found that Latinos in Suffolk County have continuously suffered civil rights violations and have a lack of protection from local officials.

Our attorneys are currently working to make sure that Suffolk County's criminal justice system is more responsive to the needs of Latino residents.

Read on for more information.

In This Issue

• LatinoJustice PRLDEF Works for Justice in Suffolk County

LatinoJustice PRLDEF Works for Justice in Suffolk County

Repeated Crimes Against Latinos Went Unanswered By Local Police

Another heinous hate crime has once again shaken Long Island's Latino community.

On Nov. 8 2008, Marcelo Lucero was walking by the Patchogue train station with a friend when seven young men, one armed with a knife, appeared out of nowhere and attacked them. Lucero's friend managed to escape and call for help, but it arrived too late. Lucero, a 37-year-old dry cleaning worker known as "primo" (cousin) by his friends in Patchogue, was surrounded and stabbed to death.

Soon after the murder, it was reported that the two men, both Ecuadorian immigrants and long-time legal residents, had been targeted by their attackers simply because they were Latino.

But Lucero and his friend were not the only ones in Suffolk County who have been victims of violence simply because of their ethnicity. Latinos in Suffolk County have continuously suffered civil rights violations, and have not received adequate protection from local officials.

On the very day Marcelo Lucero was stabbed to death, Suffolk County police responded to two separate reports of three white males partaking in criminal misconduct in Patchogue. In both instances, the men were not apprehended and were not charged.

In the early morning hours, of Nov. 8, Franklin Tigre, a laundromat worker, called the police after three teenagers tried to enter the store where he was working alone.

When he refused to let them in, one of the teens tossed a lighter into the storefront.

Tigre says he was never asked to identify any photos, even though he said he told police he recognized two of the men from Patchogue-Medford High School, where he said he graduated.

Soon after, Marlon GarcÌa called police after a group of white teenagers harassed him and shot at him with a BB gun. The officer who responded found the complaint unfounded, and said he canvassed the area looking for suspects and found none.

But GarcÌa says he pointed out the suspects, who were further up the street, to the officer.

Additionally, two men charged in the Lucero murder had actually been detained by police three days before after being identified by a Latino who had been shot at by youths yelling racial epithets. After questioning, the police released the young men without filing charges or further investigation.

Had the police done their job and arrested them, Marcelo Lucero might still be alive.

Sadly, this is just one instance in a lengthy series of discriminatory actions depriving Latinos of equal access to law enforcement agencies and their services.

The police's failure to act in incidents such as these has allowed crime, especially hate crime, against Latinos to flourish in Suffolk County.

Suffolk County had just one reported hate crime in 2008, but LatinoJustice has learned that abuses against the Latino population in the county have been continually going unanswered.

Hate crimes against Latinos are on the rise across the United States.

In 2007, local police reported to the FBI that there were 830 victims of anti-Hispanic crimes in 595 incidents around the nation. Both of these numbers represent increases over the previous year and surpass previous highs dating back to when annual reports were first mandated by the Hate Crimes Statistics Act.

With all of this in mind, LatinoJustice PRLDEF has sent a letter to the Department of Justice's Office of Civil Rights, asking representatives to look into the failure of Suffolk County to provide adequate police services for its Latino residents.

In addition, LatinoJustice continues to work to safeguard the rights of all Latinos living in Long Island.

For more information on the latest from LatinoJustice PRLDEF, visit our website at www.latinojustice.org.