S.C. man, target of shooting, urges hate crime law

When Jarvis McKenzie locked eyes with the man in the car, he couldn’t understand the hate he saw. When the man picked up a rifle, fired over his head and yelled, “You better get running, boy!” as he scrambled behind a brick wall, McKenzie knew it was because he is Black.

- By JEFFREY COLLINS

JARVIS MCKENZIE, a victim of what police called a hate crime.

McKenzie told his story a month after the shooting because South Carolina is one of two states along with Wyoming that don’t have their own hate crime laws.

About two dozen local governments in South Carolina have passed their own hate crime ordinances as the latest attempt to put pressure on the South Carolina Senate to take a vote on a bill proposing stiffer penalties for crimes driven by hatred of the victims because of their race, religion, sexual orientation, gender or ethnicity.

A decade of pressure from businesses, the survivors of a racist Charleston church massacre that left nine dead, and a few of their own Republicans hasn't been enough to sway senators.

Local ordinances have light penalties

Richland County, where McKenzie lives, has a hate crime ordinance and the white man seen on security camera video grabbing the rifle and firing through his open car window before driving into his neighborhood on July 24 is the first to face the charge.

But local laws are restricted to misdemeanors with sentences capped at a month in jail. The state hate crimes proposal backed by business leaders could add years on to convictions for assault and other crimes.

McKenzie sat in the same spot at the edge of his neighborhood for a year at 5:30 a.m. waiting for his supervisor to pick him up for work. For him and his family, every trip outside now is met with uneasiness if not fear.

Hate crime law efforts have stalled