A Miami man was arrested after hurling racial slurs – including the N-word, at two black kids and threatening to shoot and kill them after they touched his house fence. He also called them dirty.
According to the Miami Herald, the incident occurred on March 13 when the kids, aged nine and 11, were on their way to school. The accused, Gabriel Gomez, after seeing the kids touching his fence, came out and yelled at them to keep off his property.
Gomez, 31, however, did not stop there. He chased them down with his car and went ahead to point an orange-and-black handgun at them through the window, Miami-Dade police said.
“If I ever see you on this block or by my house again, I’ll kill you and nobody’s gonna be able to find you,” Gomez told the kids, the arrest report stated.
After his arrest, his house was raided and officers found several weapons, including a custom-made .50-caliber rifle with an orange tip, the Miami Herald reports. He has been charged with aggravated assault with a firearm and placed on house arrest. He also faces a “hate-crime” enhancement charge, which makes his punishment worse if found guilty. His bond has been set at $100,000.
Gomez’s attorneys tried modifying his bond at a hearing on Friday as most Miami courts have been closed as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. The incident even occurred on the same day the Miami-Dade and Broward schools ordered its schools to shut down after opting for the kids to learn online from home due to the pandemic. The announcement was made later after Gomez threatened the kids.
In a related news, an Oregon man who threatened to shoot a black teenager for riding his bike in front of his property received three years of probation and was also ordered to attend either anger management or diversity-sensitivity training.
According to The Oregonian, Michael James Black, 65, was sentenced on February 27 after he was found guilty of menacing and second-degree intimidation, an offence also considered a hate crime.
The incident occurred when the 14-year-old teenager, who was on his way home from school after basketball practice rode in front of Black’s house in Gresham, Oregon, while he was waiting for two other friends to catch up with him. Black, who was sitting in his garage when he spotted the boy allegedly hurled out racial slurs at him after telling him he was on his property, prosecutors said, according to The Oregonian.
He also threatened to blow the boy’s head off when he paid no heed to him. Fearing Black was going for a gun when he entered his house, the teenager rode off.
Black, who apologized to the teen’s mother during his sentencing hearing, was also ordered to write an apology letter to the boy and complete 150 hours of community service. He has also been prohibited from possessing weapons.
