Prosecutor: Businessman invokes Trump in attack on Muslim airline employee
ASSOCIATED PRESS
In this April 2013 file photo, a Delta Airlines jet flies past the company’s billboard at Citi Field, in New York. A Massachusetts man who authorities say assaulted a Muslim Delta Airlines employee at New York’s Kennedy Airport is facing hate crime charges.
NEW YORK >> A businessman attacked a Muslim airline employee at Kennedy Airport, kicking her, shouting obscenities at her and saying that President Donald Trump “will get rid of all of you,” authorities said.
Robin Rhodes, of Worcester, Massachusetts, had arrived from Aruba and was awaiting a connecting flight to Massachusetts on Wednesday night when he approached Delta employee Rabeeya Khan, who wears a hijab, while she was sitting in her office, the Queens district attorney said.
Khan told police that Rhodes came to the door and went on a profanity-laced tirade, asking her if she was praying, District Attorney Richard A. Brown said. Rhodes then punched the door, which hit the back of Khan’s chair, investigators said. Khan asked Rhodes what she had done to him and Rhodes replied, “You did nothing,” Brown said. He then cursed at her and kicked her in the leg, Khan told police, according to Brown.
When another person tried to calm him down, Brown said Rhodes moved away from the door and Khan ran out of the office. Rhodes followed her, got down on his knees and began to bow down to imitate Muslim prayers and shouted obscenities, investigators said.
Brown said Kahn recalled Rhodes saying: “Trump is here now. He will get rid of all of you. You can ask Germany, Belgium and France about these kinds of people. You see what happens.”
At the time of his arrest, Rhodes told officers, “I guess I am going to jail for disorderly conduct,” Brown said.
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Rhodes was charged with assault, unlawful imprisonment, menacing and harassment as hate crimes. It was not immediately clear if he has an attorney who can comment on the charges.
His mother, Dorothy Rhodes, said the behavior alleged by authorities is uncharacteristic of her son.
“It’s not like him at all,” she said. “He’s not a violent person. He’s very kind.”
Robin Rhodes is the president of Nitrofreeze Cryogenic Solutions, a metals company based in Worcester.
Dorothy Rhodes said her son “goes out of his way to hire people of different races and ethnicities.”
Brown said Rhode displayed bigotry and hatred that “have no place in a civilized society — especially in Queens County, the most culturally diverse county in the nation.”
28 responses to “Prosecutor: Businessman invokes Trump in attack on Muslim airline employee”
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What in Trump’s name is going on in Queens?!
The Libertarded Media has no news to dethrone TheDonald so they resort printing tabloid news. Man, these news media are in bad times competing with the free internet and are grabbing onto straws for readership.
How is this tabloid? Didn’t it happen? Besides, it’s no more tabloid than Trump’s policies or potential policies…or unachievable rhetoric, like a 20% tax to pay for a wall…
Pocho,stop funding the libetarD media and cancel your SA subscription. Go ,do it. You lying hypocrite.
Encouraging someone to commit suicide by overdose? Wow.
I think you said you’ve been strugglong with chronic pain and your wife’s dementia, but this is a new low, even for you, lespark. Maybe its all the narcotics you are taking.
Whatever the reasons, the Dark Lord Bannon will be pleased. Very, very pleassed.
If a muslim attacked a non-muslim… would the muslim be charged with a “hate crime” ???
Thank you. That’s a great example of the kind of question that never gets asked by people who know anything at all.
It seems like his supporters are prideful and willful about their ignorance. It’s still remarkable to me how his supporters think.
Or don’t think.
Klastri, how come Hillary lost? Seems like Mr. Trump had prideful and willfull supporters. Hillary had swillful and ignorant supporters like you.
lespark – Keep talking about the election as he spirals into madness. That will help a lot.
Whining about crowd size? He’s an adult man and the President. He acts like a 10 year-old. That kind of mental illness is going to be good for the United States. You don’t recognize that because you never know anything about any subject. Never.
It’s not that they don’t think so much as refuse to – or are perhaps incapable. Take this blank-firing dim bulb who follows you around from story to story for instance. Ask him what he’s trying to accomplish and garrans the best he’ll come up with is that he’s trying to be irritating.
If that person was shouting obscenities about the non-Muslim being non-Muslim and attacking someone specifically for being non-Muslim (or a specific alternate religion), then yes. Maybe your small mind can’t comprehend simple logic, but it’s not really that hard.
Yes, if the attacker used racist language towards the attackee. Pretty simple but I guess too complex for you.
Nah, probably charged with terrorism instead.
Marauders and Tiger, try focusing on the issue at hand, we have a hate crime here, do we not?
You can shelve your hypothetical…
There is no “Marauders and tiger” – and Tiger’s only hypothetical In this case was the nutty one he responded to. You focus. You shelve.
advertiser1 is correct. When you congratulate marauder on his post being a “great example”, you imply that your focus aligns with his.
Well then, congratulations to the both of you for you inability to comprehend anything after the first couple of words.
Because this idiot made the assault at an airport, against an airline employee, I assume that he will face more serious, federal charges than he would if he did it on the street. Maybe learn a lesson from this ?? but I doubt it. Delta might just ban him from flying their airline!
Becuz Trumpland.
Nut job.
What is it with Aruba – Drugs? Alcohol?
Nut job…..throw the book at him
Future Trump staffer.
Hey mom, you should tell your son to watch the Ellen DeGeneres show. At the end of each show, she says, “Be kind to one another.” And, tell him to GROW UP.
Sad! Bad for his business. Could be his business is failing due to his bizarre attitude?
“Nitrofreeze Cryogenic Solutions” Sounds like it escaped from a Sci-Fi film and is heading for a chilling conclusion.
Welcome to Donald Trump’s America.
He has given a voice to the ignorant, racists, bigots, white supremacists and dim wits. It’s a national tragedy.