[Peace-discuss] hate crime :Dec. 8 , Champaign

[Michael Walcher]

Hi all: hope you're well. A friend of mine has asked that I forward the
below email about a possible hate crime at U of I.  The victim and his
family are seeking help in moving forward with efforts to prosecute the
perpetrators.  The victim's information is at the bottom of the email.
Please pass along to any listservs in the Chicago area as well.

****************************

On Saturday Dec. 8th, approx. 1 AM, outside of a University of Illinois
campus bar, a group of friends made their way back to their respective
homes. Unfortunately as they left, they didn´t notice that one of their
friends was being ridiculed by a number of people outside of the bar.  
The hostile group delayed this person until he was alone.  They proceeded 
to attack this person, Vishal Desai, until he was unconscious, his nose 
was broken, he had two fractures in his face, he had deep cuts all over his
face, his eye was so severely kicked that is was moved out of place 
which resulted in blurry double vision. After numerous surgeries and visits 
to the doctor, he has still not recovered.  He has permanent damage to his eye 
and nightmares about the attackers. Vishal Desai is a Asian American who 
was attacked by a group of white fraternity boys.

The University of Illinois as well as the Champaign police department 
have not done anything to bring the attackers to justice.  The Police 
department as well as the University know exactly what fraternity the assailants 
belong to and they know the severity of the crime, yet nothing is being done 
about this. Champaign county police as well as the University are trying to 
keep this case hush hush because of the bad publicity it may cause. The 
attack happened on December 8th and it is now almost March.  The only thing 
that has happened is Vishal and a friend have identified possible assailants
through student ID´s.  The only reason even this happened was because 
of Vishal's diligence.  The University as well as the Champaign police 
seem very apathetic about the whole matter.

What we need help with it to pressure the police department to further 
the investigation and find the assailants before May when school lets out 
--otherwise it will be too late.

Also, we need a lawyer to help us sue either the Bar, the suspected
Fraternity, or the University.  The bar that the incident happened 
outside
of is responsible for providing alcohol to the underage assailants, as 
well as having a bartender who is covering up information, and a bouncer who 
saw it all happen outside of the bar and did nothing.  The suspected 
fraternity is responsible for not assisting the police with the investigation as 
well is giving false information.  They failed to provide a composite 
picture of the members of the fraternity, making it harder for Vishal to identify 
them. And according to the Detective on the case, the University is making it 
hard for him to proceed with the case.

If you can help out in any way, please contact us. Thank you.

Sharmili Desai (sharmilidesai at yahoo.com) (victim's sister)

Vishal Desai
vkdesai at students.uiuc.edu
308 E. Armory Apt #208
Champaign IL 61820
(217) 367-1252






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