Allentown Racial Assault Update - Kari Holmes Doing Well

On Friday, I told you about Dr. Karen Holmes, an Allentown minister who participates in Unity in Diversity workshops. Sadly, her daughter - Kari - is the recent victim of what appears to be a racially motivated assault. Karen has been kind enough to update and included me in her email. I would like to share her comments with those of you who expressed or felt concern.

Hello and Thank you,

Thank you for the absolute outpouring of love, the support from every sector of the Valley and the Heaven load of prayers. The massive show of compassion helps to heal. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. Even those who do not know Kari have flooded her with expressions of concern, love prayers. I appreciate that you understand that what happens to one of us happens to all of us.

And yes, I also appreciate the sense of horror and outrage. It is time for all of us to do our part in forging and implementing actionable strategies.

Future updates: Rather that email all of you, I will ask Kimberly to put a blog on our church web site or the church’s MySpace page. Many have had good suggestions toward actionable plan. Many want to continue expressions support to Kari. Both can be done there. Hopefully, Moses Clark, will organize/coordinate an actionable strategic plan in for our community. I hope The Holmes Family will now record and distribute the song we did for Life Church, "Justice Is Righteousness" and sometime this week I expect to post the rest of "Hate Is Not A Color".

About Kari: Kari did finally go to the hospital. X-rays were the extent of an examination. The X-rays did not show anything broken or fractured. Her neck is swollen and her body is sore. None of that was looked at in the hospital. Right about now she's glad her mom is one of those radical "faith healers" and she knows that Jesus is the Great Physician by first hand experience. She will be well. Kari keeps ministering the Word to herself, most especially II Timothy 1:7; and doesn’t Psalm 107:20 tell us He sent His Word and healed them and delivered them...His Word will heal her spirit and psyche. Saturday was a rough day for her. Fear kept trying to creep in when she needed to go out to take care of some things. There is counseling for victims of crime and she will look into it. She needs your prayers, your love, and your good will while the Balm of Gilead does His work. Ministering is life to our family; thankfully, Kari has been working with church in NJ so Sunday is like a B 12 shot for her…and today their choir has another service, so it’s a mega B 12. God is altogether lovely in all His ways. She will be following through with other plans of action on this matter come Monday and will spend the week tying up everything for the Thurs-Sun National Day Of Prayer observances. Kari does ask for your support and presence at these observances "but especially Sunday". Please put them on your calendar and in your plans.

The National Day of Prayer: Kari does ask for your support and presence at these observances "but especially Sunday". Please put the dates on your calendar and in your plans:
Thursday May 1st
11am –2pm City United at Allentown’s 7th Street Monument, Hamilton St.
7pm –9pm First Baptist Church, 1808 N 19th St, Altwn, Pastor Neil Kulp
Friday, May 2nd
7pm -10pm Youth Praying at The Forte Bldg. 1337 E 5th St, Bethlehem, Pa
Saturday, May 3rd
6pm -10pm At The Forte Bldg. 1337 E 5th St Bethlehem, Pa
Sunday, May 4th
6pm - 8pm Region United at First Baptist Church 3235 Linden St, Bethlm.
The Regional National Day Of Prayer, Sunday evening worship begins with covered dish fellowship.

The police: Some of you know that when a police report was sought on Thursday afternoon, there was none to be found. My guess is that it was in process for filing, since The Call apparently got a copy and we now have one. Did the tide change because the community began to express its displeasure? One thing I know for certain, the tide changed, and the change was very good.

Concerning the police officer who came on Thursday who did not want to get too friendly before getting the facts; maybe he should be dispatched somewhere other than someone's home and deal with something other than people, since shaking a victims hand at their door or in their home is "too friendly:" at least, something more suited to his style and personality.

On the two deceives came on Thursday: There was a slight edginess at the door that made me wonder who made them come. But both of them were the appropriate combination of professional and cordial. The detective who was actually making the report asked his questions without “attitude” or conversely, without being “overly understanding.” He is a wonderful example of a community servant in the job of being diligent with data and human with human beings. The detectives took us to where the hate crime took place and got a good handle on how and where it all occurred.

We were going to meet the detectives at the police station so Kari look at photos and write out her own account. When that did not work out, Detective Good-at-his-job, and another detective came back and picked us up. This young detective continued to be professional, thorough and patient. Kari might have a different perspective; she kept trembling during the process and at one point bowed her head and cried. The detective didn’t rush her, he simply let her collect herself and then quietly continued. It did take hours.

Important Police Point: The Allentown police do not have any such category of crime to do with “hate crimes.” This is simply classified as an “assault.”

No information was given about what to do in the case of "hate crime." The President of the NAACP let Kari know that hate crimes are handled by the State Police.

The City:
As to the hate and bigotry that is alive and ill in the Valley: it must be eradicated. I plead all sectors of our community to do our part in forging and implementing actionable strategies to that end: and to give real aid to victims of such crimes; and to make necessary information available.

Hate and bigotry must be eradicated from the streets, the courts, from the newspapers, from the educational institutions and process, from business and corporate policies, intuitional and political norm and everywhere else it festers. We have to own up to it, address it and correct it; appropriately...aggressively.... now...not later. Denial has been damaging, delay has been costly.
Excuses are just that, x uses: things that neither you nor I, nor anyone else has any use for:

We also need to address and correct some ills that are not necessarily borne of bigotry, but are bad policy, menacing mistakes, abuse of power, and apathy at the knowledge of those that do.

I appreciate the emails, messages and calls from the mayor, council members, police chief, community action head and members: especially the action of the community action committee. Let us continue to take the outrage and horror at this hate crime to right our wrongs--I appreciate actionable strategies to eradicate and educate concerning hate crimes.

HATE IS NOT A COLOR – IT IS A SPIRIT
It is a spirit that will inflame your emotions
Play with your mind and dictate your actions
It will twist your ties and corrupt your commitments
Hate will poison your legacy and pollute your progeny
And make you less of a person than any person was meant to be. KEH