Black and Chinese American Communities Remember Vincent Chin
Remembering Vincent Chin
On June 26th 2020, members of the African
American and Asian American communities joined together in a ceremony commemorate
the death of Vincent Chin who was brutally beaten to death by two unemployed
White automobile workers in Detroit on June 19, 1982. The ceremony was held in
San Francisco, CA with members of the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent
Association, San Francisco Peace Collective, and Black community leaders. The
two suspects Ronald Ebens and Michael Nitz, never went to prison and only
served seven years of probation after being found guilty of manslaughter.
The Incident
On June 19th, 1982 Vincent Jen Chin (May 18, 1955
– June 23, 1982) was at the Fancy Pants Night Club in Detroit, MI celebrating
his bachelor party. Chin of Chinese decent was approached by a disgruntled
Ebans and Nitz that showed angst towards Asians (particularly the Japanese) as
the American auto industry was taking an economic loss as the Japanese auto
industry boomed. The Japanese auto boom resulted in the two men losing their
jobs. The two men, assuming Chin was Japanese, made some derogatory comments as
they approached Chin at the night club. After the incident in the club, the two
men went around town looking for Chin for a fight. Eventually they found Chin
and beat Chin with a baseball bat until Chin's skull cracked open. Chin was rushed
to Henry Ford Hospital and died after four days in a coma on June 23, 1982.
The Aftermath
Chin’s death predated the hate crime laws in the United
States. Members of the Asian community do not feel that Ebans and Nitz paid for
their crime. As with the plight African Americans, the Asian Community feels
that the perpetrators of a hate crime were given a light sentence because they
were white. In 2010, the city of Ferndale, Michigan erected a legal milestone commemorating the murder of Chin in his memory.
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