Two young Richmond women were left shaken and crying after being on the wrong end of a shameful racist and homophobic road rage rant.
The couple – who don’t want to be identified for fear of reprisals – were subjected by another young woman to a couple of minutes of threats and disgusting verbal abuse in a shopping centre parking lot Thursday evening.
Most of the vile encounter was captured on video as the pair, who are in a relationship, locked themselves in their car with the windows closed around 8 p.m. in the Broadmoor Shopping Centre at Williams and No. 3 roads.
In the video, the female aggressor can be heard shouting homophobic abuse at the couple, along with a South Asian racial slur, apparently directed at one of the couple, despite her identifying as Indigenous.
A few seconds later, the racist ranter can be seen jumping out of her silver SUV, before walking over to the couple’s car, trying to open their door and screaming more homophobic abuse.
Unprovoked attack
Melissa (name changed) told the Richmond News on Friday morning that the unprovoked attack started when she and her partner, Courtney (also name changed), were driving through the parking lot after getting groceries at FreshCo.
“As we drive along, this person started reversing. She was going to hit us so (Courtney) tapped on her horn to let her know that we were there,” Melissa explained.
“The girl in the car started yelling at us. We just drove on. We were driving closer to the gas station, where my car was parked, and we noticed this person was driving really close behind us and following us.”
That’s when, according to Melissa, the driver of the silver SUV, understood to be in her 20s, pulled up next to them and kicked off her rant.
“We tried to ignore it, but they seemed to know we were in a relationship so they started yelling homophobic stuff at us,” added Melissa.
“I think we passed them in FreshCo and we were holding hands so I guess that’s when they realized. We’ve never seen them before last night.”
Anger, then crying
Melissa said she and her girlfriend’s hearts were racing and the pair later went through a gamut of emotions, from anger to crying.
“You hear about stuff like this happening, but I’ve lived in Richmond for more than 10 years and never experienced anything like that,” she said.
“People have said stuff, but never has anyone try to get into our car.”
As the incident came to a close, the female passenger of the SUV jumped out and tried to obscure their license plate as Melissa took a photo of it.
“While I was on the phone to the police, the (driver) did come back, this time on foot,” added Melissa.
“She was across the street yelling at us and walked into the middle of the road, giving us the finger.”
Police tracked down suspect
Melissa said the police arrived shortly afterwards, took down the details and later tracked down the driver of the SUV.
“They found them and talked to them. The police basically said there was nothing they could really do.”
The couple has since shared the video with some people in the community who identified the driver of the SUV as someone who is known to police and are “known troublemakers, involved in all kinds of bullying and vandalism.”
The News has reached out to Richmond RCMP for more details of the incident.
