Attack in Shenandoah follows immigrant's fatal July beating

SHENANDOAH, Pa. - An assault of a Mexican man has put this Schuylkill County town on edge again, two months after the widely publicized beating death of another Mexican man.

On Friday, Javier Alcala Jr., 21, allegedly was abducted and beaten by three men who duct-taped and blindfolded him.

This follows the July 12 killing of Luis Eduardo Ramirez Zavala, 25, an illegal immigrant who had been living in the U.S. for six years. He allegedly was pummeled near a local park after a confrontation with at least four teenage boys.

Four white youths face charges in the killing, which prosecutors have labeled a hate crime. Witnesses say that the teens yelled racial epithets. Three of the four youths are former football players for the Shenandoah Valley High School Blue Devils.

The killing polarized the community and attracted unwanted national attention to this town of 5,200, which is nestled in the lower anthracite coal region about 100 miles northwest of Philadelphia.
 

Shenandoah police yesterday confirmed details of the Alcala beating, which also is being reviewed by the FBI and the Justice Department.

Alcala, of Shenandoah, was hit on the head from behind. His mouth, hands and legs were duct-taped. He was then forced into an SUV, said lawyer Gladys Limon of the Los Angeles-based Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF).

Alcala suffered a head injury, damaged teeth, bruises and an arm injury, said Limon, who contacted Justice Department officials over the weekend. Police have interviewed the victim twice, including once at a hospital, Shenandoah Mayor Tom O'Neill said.

The case is under investigation, and no one has labeled the beating a racially motivated crime.

But Brent Wilkes, of the League of United Latin American Citizens, said: "We're very concerned that this is another case of people acting out animosity toward immigrants."

Last night, Pennsylvania State Police and Shenandoah cops executed a search warrant at a house where investigators believe Alcala was taken during his ordeal.

Two suspects, a woman and a man, were in police custody last night and were being questioned about the case, police said.

Alcala's legal status is unclear, but victims of violent crimes who are not U.S. citizens are eligible for visas that would allow them a legal path to citizenship.

The sun was still out, but mosquitoes were circling. Some folks carried placards - "Gallon of Gas: $3.69, Purchase of a Gun: $419, Deportation: Priceless," - that hinted at the turmoil that has simmered and occasionally boiled over since Ramirez's death.

Midway through the anti-illegal-immigrant rally, Crystal Dillman, who had been Ramirez's fiancee, arrived with her sister and some friends. The women, all of whom are white, unfurled a large Mexican flag.

"I'm here to support the cause; I'm here to support my husband," said Dillman, a Shenandoah native, quickly amending her statement to say "fiancee."

When some in the crowd noticed them and the flag, they shouted: "Why don't you go to Mexico?" and "Go home, Crystal!"

But the mother of three held her ground. "I'm not going nowhere," she said. "Let them say what whatever they want."

The trash-talk continued: "Wetback kids!" was directed toward Dillman's group. Her sister Lita responded joyfully with her arms raised in obscene gestures.

The tension escalated until state troopers stepped in, standing as a barrier around the Mexican flag until the crowd dispersed.

The confrontation underscored the upheaval in the town after four local teens were charged in Ramirez's death.

To many white people in Shenandoah - pronounced "Shenan-doe" by locals - the killing was an unfortunate result of a brawl that got out of hand. To other white residents and the growing Latino population, Ramirez was a victim of a hate crime because he was Mexican.

Three of the teens - Brandon Piekarsky, 16, Colin Walsh, 17, and Derrick Donchak, 18 - were arrested and charged July 25, nearly two weeks after the alleged beating. An unidentified fourth defendant was charged Sept. 5 in juvenile court with aggravated assault, ethnic intimidation and other offenses.

Piekarsky and Walsh, who have been banned from the high school, were charged with criminal homicide, aggravated assault and ethnic intimidation, among other crimes. Donchak, who was enrolled this summer at Bloomsburg University - but according to school officials has no plans on returning - was charged with aggravated assault, ethnic intimidation and other offenses.

Piekarsky, a National Honor Society student, and Walsh were each released on $50,000 bail on Aug. 26. Donchak had been released earlier. A pretrial hearing is set for Sept. 29 at the Schuylkill County Courthouse in Pottsville. The FBI and the Justice Department are investigating the killing.

The beating death has been chronicled in the Washington Post, the New York Times and People magazine. An independent filmmaker is producing a documentary about it.

The racial slurs that allegedly accompanied the beating led MALDEF and the Anti-Defamation League to speak out against the crime and to visit the town.

The case struck a nerve partly because it is a conflict between earlier immigrants - the English, Welsh and Scottish, and later the Italians and Poles - and today's immigrants, primarily Mexicans and Dominicans.

"The people who live here now are just not practiced in living with a new culture," said Lou Ann Pleva, a Polish-American who helped organize a "Unity Celebration" to counter the rally. "It's a small community that really hasn't seen much change across the board."

Latino hate crimes rose nationally by almost 35 percent between 2003 and 2006, according to FBI statistics compiled by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

"A death is one of the most severe consequences for this type of hatred," said Limon, of MALDEF, who also represents Dillman. "We wanted to ensure there would be justice, and also we believe that this is part of a very unfortunate trend of crimes against Latinos."

Dan Amato, a speaker at the rally, disagreed. "They were boys, there was no organization or group that told them to go out and do that," he said later.

MALDEF and other organizations are interfering in Shenandoah, said Amato, who lives in the Plymouth Meeting area and runs an anti-illegal immigrant Web site, www.diggersrealm.com.

"Everybody's divided," said town resident Adrienne Jefferis. "The majority of white people look at nonwhites with suspicion."

To retired Philadelphia cop Eileen Burke, who lives on the street where Ramirez was beaten, his illegal status should not have constituted a license to kill.

"What's right is right," said Burke, 53, who called 9-1-1 on the night of the beating. "I mean, I didn't know he was illegal, those kids didn't know that he was illegal, who's to know that he was illegal at that time? . . . That has nothing to do with it.

"A life is a life."

The life in question came to the United States from Guanajuato state in central Mexico, Dillman said. Authorities say that he arrived illegally about six years ago. Nicknamed "Caballo," Spanish for "horse," he met Dillman at a local festival in July 2005.

A month later, in the Wal-Mart parking lot, he gave her a ring that he'd bought inside, and mustered up the English to ask her to marry him, she said. Dillman cried and said yes, but they never married.

The couple had two children together, Kiara, 2, and Eduardo, who just turned 1. Ramirez also was a father figure to Dillman's eldest daughter, Anjelina, 3, Dillman said.

Ramirez - whom Dillman called a "really nice guy" and a "very respectful person" - worked two jobs, six days a week, she said. He lived mostly in Georgia, traveling to Shenandoah about once a month, she said.

She last saw him at 10:25 p.m., about an hour before the beating. She remembers looking at the clock.

The night that shattered her heart began at 7 p.m. Donchak, Piekarsky and two others were drinking beer and malt liquor in an area known as "the Creek."

After 11 p.m., Piekarsky, Walsh, Donchak and three 17-year-olds ran into Ramirez and Dillman's teenage half-sister.

Another youth, Brian Scully, told the teen it was late to be out, testified Joseph Benjamin Lawson, a teen who is a witness for the prosecution.

Ramirez responded to Scully aggressively in Spanish, Lawson said at the preliminary hearing, adding that Scully was the only teen in the group to make such a comment, telling Ramirez: "This is Shenandoah. This is America. Go back to Mexico."

According to an affidavit of probable cause in the case, Ramirez and the girl began to walk away, when one of the youths called Ramirez a "spic," prompting Ramirez to respond: "What is your problem?"

Piekarsky, Walsh and an unnamed 17-year-old then ran toward Ramirez and a fight broke out. Ramirez called some friends on his cell phone, the affidavit says.

Around that time, Dillman received a text message from Ramirez's phone: help.

According to the affidavit, Walsh punched Ramirez in the face, knocking him to the ground, and he hit his head on the roadway.

Across the street, Burke, the retired Philly cop, heard the "F word, slurs and Mexican this and that" for a few minutes, she recalled in an interview at her home.

Burke heard a high-pitched female voice screaming, "Stop kicking him, stop beating him," she said.

She called for an ambulance, and when she looked outside, she saw a group of youths in a circle and heard the thuds of kicking. Burke said that she did not see the youths kicking Ramirez.

By the time she went out into the street, Burke said, she saw a young man emitting what cops call the "death rattle," the labored breathing that often precedes death. Ramirez was foaming at the mouth, his body convulsing so feverishly that "he was bouncing off the ground."

Ramirez was taken to a hospital in Ashland - Burke said it took an out-of-town ambulance 20 minutes to arrive - and then was flown to Geisinger Medical Center in Danville, where he underwent brain surgery. He died July 14. He was buried in Mexico.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.