No Room for Hatred

The one-year anniversary of the shooting of five people at a Jewish community center and the brutal slaying of a Filipino American postal worker were marked by solemn ceremonies Thursday in Chatsworth and Granada Hills.

Friends, family and colleagues gathered at the Chatsworth Post Office for the unveiling of a bronze plaque in remembrance of letter carrier Joseph Ileto, who was gunned down as he delivered mail in a Chatsworth neighborhood allegedly by avowed white supremacist Buford O. Furrow Jr.

In Granada Hills, staff at the North Valley Jewish Community Center gathered for a tree planting ceremony at the sprawling Rinaldi Street campus, where Furrow allegedly walked into a summer day camp and opened fire. The bloody rampage left three young boys, a teenage counselor and a receptionist injured.

Known to the world as the Filipino American postal worker killed because he was a man of color working for the federal government, Ileto was remembered during the morning ceremony by those who truly knew him--as a beloved son, brother, friend and co-worker.

Chatsworth postal employees collected money for a plaque to remember their friend and colleague who enjoyed such simple things as playing chess and telling jokes. The marker includes the inscription, “He gave the ultimate sacrifice for his country. May he never be forgotten.”

“This [plaque] is kind of special because it came from his co-workers who are out there every day doing the same thing he was doing last year,” said Ileto’s brother Ismael, addressing a crowd of about 200 people as his toddler son, Kyle, mother, Lilian, and sisters Carmina and Raquel looked on.

Calling for an end to ethnic hatred and violence, Ileto said that his brother would best be remembered if people resolved to promote tolerance and celebrate diversity.

“We need to end this hate,” he said. “Hate is eating away at the country; it affects every one of us.”

While postal workers are prepared for dog bites and robberies, no amount of training could have prepared Ileto for such a vicious attack, said Bev Mattes, president of Tri-Valley Branch 2902 of the National Assn. of Letter Carriers.

“The message here was a message of hate for minorities and for the government,” Mattes said, emotion rising in her voice. “There was no way for anyone to prepare for that eventuality.”

Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Sherman Oaks) called the killing a senseless act of violence by a “man with hate in his heart who tried to come and tear our community asunder. But those efforts failed.”

At the conclusion of his remarks, Sherman presented the Ileto family an American flag that had flown over the U.S. Capitol and a certificate of its authenticity.

An afternoon butterfly release by children attending summer camp at the Community Center was abruptly canceled Thursday by center officials who cited privacy concerns.

Instead, staff members gathered on the center’s front lawn to plant a tree to symbolize a new beginning.

Isabelle Shalometh, the receptionist who was wounded in the Aug. 10, 1999, attack, stood with a group of staff members, but did not address the assembled news media.

“One year ago on this day, the rhetoric of cause-less hatred spurred a troubled soul to perform a horrible act. However, the entire Los Angeles community responded, and continues to respond, from unconditional love,” said Nina Lieberman Giladi, associate executive vice president of Jewish Community Centers, which operates the North Valley facility.

Lieberman Giladi, whose son was on campus during the shooting spree, said she does not consider the center or her family victims.

“The great success of love over hate is this: We did not panic, we made a chain of love. We were not intimidated, but emboldened,” she said. “One isolated act of hatred will not slow down our important work of building community.”