Women can be charged with hate crimes Suspected attack Police in Texas say a Palestinian-American family was shot in their apartment complex’s swimming pool.
Witnesses said the family was enjoying themselves at the complex’s pool on May 19 when 42-year-old Elizabeth Wolfe confronted them and demanded to know where they were from.
“Tell her you’re going to kill her and kill her whole family.”
The Euless Police Department said officers Responded Police responded to a report of a disturbance between two women and when they arrived on scene, witnesses reported an intoxicated woman attempting to drown a child and arguing with the child’s mother.
The child’s mother told police that Wolf accused them of not being American and asked if the child was really hers.
In a media statement Saturday, a spokesperson for the Texas chapter of the Council on Islamic American Relations called for the incident to be prosecuted as a hate crime.
“The suspect reportedly approached the mother whilst questioning her in racist terms, then jumped into the swimming pool, grabbed the children in the deep end and attempted to drown them,” the council said.
The woman jumped into the pool and her son was able to escape, but her daughter’s head was forced underwater, police allege.
“The suspect snatched the mother’s headscarf and used it to hit her, then kicked her away and pushed the daughter’s head underwater,” CAIR added.
“I don’t know where I can go to feel safe with my children.”
The child’s mother spoke to CAIR about the incident and gave her details.
She said a passerby, who she described as an African-American man, ran over to help the woman’s daughter.
As police handcuffed him, Wolfe allegedly yelled, “Tell them I’m going to kill her and I’m going to kill her whole family.”
“We are American citizens of Palestinian origin, and we don’t know where we can go to be safe with our children,” the mother said in a statement released by CAIR.
“My country is facing war and we are facing hatred here. My daughter is traumatized,” she continued. “Every time I open the door to our apartment, she runs and hides, scared that that woman will come and put her head under water again. Also, my husband’s employment is in jeopardy as he has to take time off work to be with me and our four children and run errands.”
Wolf was charged with attempted murder and injury to a child. He was held on $25,000 bail for the attempted murder charge and $15,000 bail for the injury to a child charge. Police have not said whether the woman lived in the apartment.
The White House released a statement about the incident.
“I am deeply troubled by the reports of the near-drowning of a 3-year-old Palestinian-American boy in his local pool,” Biden’s statement read. “No child should ever be subjected to violence, and my heart goes out to the family.”
The Tarrant County District Attorney’s Office said it is considering filing hate crime charges against the woman.
Euless is a suburb of the Dallas-Fort Worth area with a population of approximately 51,000.
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