Marine Park, Brooklyn racial attack

The Marine Park attack was an attack, suspected to be racially motivated, that took place in the Brooklyn, New York neighborhood of Marine Park on March 30, 2005. In the attack, a group of black teenaged female students from Marine Park High School chased six local white girls off of a basketball court and through a park. The African American girls reportedly physically harassed the girls while screaming such phrases as "honky bitches" and "white crackers", also shouting shouted "black power" and "Martin Luther King". Five black girls were arrested and were charged under the state hate crimes law, raising what might have been relatively minor counts to alleged felonies that included gang assault. The five, however, were given probationary sentences by Judge Stewart Weinstein of Kings County Family Court. The mothers of at least some of those attacked wrote to the judge, and, quoting Nelson Mandela, asked for compassion.