Kathleen Collins #racist jta.org

A Boston-area woman has been arrested and charged with leaving a series of paper swastikas outside the house of a Jewish lawyer who is representing her child’s father in an ongoing custody battle

The case had been a source of fear and confusion in the local community for months, since the Jewish woman being targeted, Stephanie Lyons, first found the swastikas on her front lawn in Stoneham in November

Lyons told The Washington Post that the swastikas had particularly unnerved her amid a larger climate of antisemitism; the incident came only a few days after rapper Kanye West launched what would become an extended antisemitic tirade

“I just burst into tears,” she told the Post. “Someone had taken the time to cut these swastikas out of paper and write those words. They knew where we lived. They knew we were Jewish”

Now local police have concluded that the culprit did in fact know Lyons. They have charged Kathleen Collins with a civil rights violation and two counts of witness intimidation, the Boston Globe reported

Collins had previously made derogatory statements about Lyons during a video call with her son and his father, according to the police report, which also said she later reportedly admitted to the father that she had put out the swastikas. They also contained antisemitic messages including “JESUS HATER” and “GO TO HELL, JEW BITCH”

3 comments

Confused?

So were we! You can find all of this, and more, on Fundies Say the Darndest Things!

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