Don’t Stand By When Hate Shows Its Face : Trial Explores Group Responsibility in Attack; Our Community Shares a Larger Burden

The beating of a 57-year-old man in Laguna Beach in early 1993 at the hands of a group of young attackers was an especially shocking hate crime. Left for dead, Loc Minh Truong had his teeth shattered, his left eye torn from the socket and the back of his head impaled on a rock.

Two of the young men have been convicted in the attack on different charges, but both pleaded guilty to the commission of a hate crime, attacking Truong because they thought he was gay. Now, beyond the disposition of criminal charges, a civil trial raises interesting questions of group responsibility. Truong has sued 10 youths who were present during the attack, including the two convicted assailants; he is seeking help to pay his medical bills and other expenses.

At issue is whether people can stand by without intervening when their presence can be construed as encouraging an attack. Six of the other eight have settled out of court while denying any responsibility, and it is likely a seventh defendant will be dismissed. That leaves the two convicted youths and one other. The lawyer for that third youth says his client had no idea that the attack was planned and that he happened to be along. This case appears to pose a challenge to the notion of not holding someone liable for failing to prevent harm.

However this case goes, it is a reminder of the larger responsibilities of the community as a whole to work toward the prevention of hate crimes. If the focus in the civil litigation is on those who allegedly witnessed the attack, the spotlight is also on the rest of us to work to create an atmosphere where such crimes are increasingly unlikely to occur.

Already, public education efforts in the county have resulted in stepped-up efforts by the Orange County Human Relations Commission, which began compiling lists of hate crimes in 1990. Since then, a number of local authorities have met from time to time to coordinate efforts.

We are increasingly aware of the need to get along in Orange County. In a telephone poll done by The Times last year, one-third of respondents said that discrimination in their own community was getting worse, even with the work being done by the groups. The county, once overwhelmingly white, is now diverse. Seventy years ago, Catholics were targets of bigotry and members of the Ku Klux Klan sat for a time on the City Council in Anaheim. Times have changed, the county is vastly more enlightened, but working to prevent hate crimes remains important work for all of us.