Photo by Tdorante10 via Wikimedia Commons
Police arrested a woman accused of shouting anti-Asian hate at several people in a Manhattan salon, including a plainclothes New York Police Department officer, New York Daily News reports.
Sharon Williams, 50, entered Good Choice for Nails salon on Madison St. near James St around 5 p.m. on Tuesday and began shouting at workers.
“You brought the corona to this country,” she allegedly said.
Police say she also used Asian slurs and threatened violence, according to WLNY. She then allegedly walked outside and began shouting at an Asian American man. The man she reportedly called a “Chinese motherf—–” was a plainclothes NYPD officer.
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The officer called for backup and Williams was arrested. She is charged with aggravated harassment as a hate crime and criminal trespass.
The arrest comes on the heels of a recent NYPD initiative announced last month. The NYPD said it would be deploying undercover Asian American officers to combat the rise in Asian American hate crimes, The Hill reports.
“The next person you target, whether it’s through speech, menacing activity, or anything else, walking along a sidewalk or a train platform, may be a plainclothes New York City police officer. So think twice,” NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea said last week, according to The Hill.
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