Florida Sikh shot while driving in suspected hate crime

SHANE KOKA
VANCOUVER DESI

Just over a month after a California Gurdwara was the target of an armed robbery, a Sikh man may have been the target of a hate crime on America’s other coast. Last Saturday, around 11 p.m., 46-year-old Kanwaljit Singh was driving home from work with his teenage son, when was approached by a dark, late model Ford F-150 near the Dunlawton Bridge of Port Orange, Fla.

The pickup opened fire on Singh’s car, unloading a total of six bullets in the driver’s side, before speeding off, and Singh stopped on the bridge. Only then did he realize that he was shot, twice: once in the thigh and once in the torso. Mercifully, the 13-year-old boy was uninjured. Singh was rushed to Halifax Health Medical Center, where he remains in critical condition after regaining consciousness Sunday night.

Police do not believe that this was a random event; Kanwaljit Singh was wearing a turban. Port Orange Assistant Chief Wayne Miller told the Daytona Beach News Journal “Although no clear motive (behind the attack) has been established, initial indications are this shooting was not a random act. There was no previous confrontation between occupants of either vehicle.” The FBi have also agreed to lend resources to help apprehend the suspects.

According to local resident and Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund  (SALDEF) regional director Navtej Singh Khalsa, this was likely due to the assailants’ mistaking Singh, ironically an American, for being Middle Eastern.  “Since Sept. 11, Sikhs have often been the targets of hate crimes because of their visible outward appearance, primarily the wearing of the turban,” Khalsa explained to the Daytona Beach News Journal. “In the past three years, hate crimes against Sikhs have risen across the country.”

The city of Port Orange, where Singh opened his convenience store a scant 10 days before being shot, is over 91 per cent Caucasian according to the most recent census data. In the past month alone, local police responded to two incidents of hate crimes in the area.

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