Black Women Accused Of Racist Attack At Asian-Owned Beauty Shop Claim They Were ‘Profiled’
From left: Daquiesha Williams and Keaundra Young | Source: Houston Police Department
Two Black women accused of participating in a racist attack against the Asian owner of a beauty shop in Houston last week claim they were the ones who were actually targeted and forced to defend themselves.
Daquiesha Williams and Keaundra Young were charged with varying degrees of assault from the altercation that took place on March 17, one day after a suspected white supremacist went on a deadly shooting spree at three Asian-owned businesses in and near Atlanta, killing eight people including six Asian women.
Jung Kim, who is Korean and owns the beauty shop in Harris County, was called “little Asian girl” during the attack, local NBC News affiliate Click 2 Houston reported. The attack, which began after Williams and Young allegedly knocked over several wig displays, reportedly left the business owner with a broken nose that will require surgery to repair.
The owner’s son claims Williams and Young “started saying something like some racial words like, ‘Asian people shouldn’t be in the Black market.’”
The Houston Chronicle shared a portion of video surveillance from the encounter.
An assault on the Korean owners of a beauty supply shop in Houston is being investigated as a possible hate crime, police said. The attackers used racial language during the assault, one victim told The Chronicle. https://t.co/nTxfgLcVjc pic.twitter.com/1TFTCDiCDn
— Houston Chronicle (@HoustonChron) March 24, 2021
The encounter later spilled out into the parking lot, where the business owner’s son and his father claim they were nearly run over by the car carrying Williams and Young.
However, Williams and Young tell a different story. Not only do they claim they were racially “profiled” from the moment they entered the store but they also said the purported video evidence was edited to fit the narrative provided to and by the police.
“I felt like we were getting profiled because it was a group of black women, young women at that point,” Williams, who was charged with assault, told Click 2 Houston.
She said she “never touched anyone” and “never said anything to no one” and suggested that she and Young — who was charged with aggravated assault — were depicted incorrectly on a doctored video.
“They showed you certain clips of the video to make it seem like it was these angry black women just randomly attacking people and that’s not the case,” Williams added.
She said the owner’s husband tried to physically block their car as she and Young tried to leave the parking lot.
“If somebody’s jumping in front of your car with a weapon and you’re trying to back up… I had somebody in the front of me and the back of me,” Williams explained. “I have no choice but to go forward.”
The store owner’s son denied accusations of racial profiling and altering the video footage.
There has been heightened awareness surrounding anti-Asian attacks and rhetoric following last week’s mass shooting in Georgia. Robert Aaron Long was charged with eight counts of murder for his admitted shootings at Asian spas that he said were prompted by his sex addiction, an assertion that spotlights Asian stereotypes, not unlike the racist trope that the beauty shop owner’s son claimed was espoused by Wiliams and Young.
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