‘There is so much hate going on’
Key marathon figures alarmed by domestic acts
Key figures in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombings say they are alarmed by the apparent rise of domestic political terrorism after a driver at a rally of white nationalists plowed a car into counterprotesters, killing a woman.
“It’s clear that these neo-Nazis and fascists have no place in our society, so we have to do everything we can to speak out against it,” said Edward F. Davis, the former Boston police commissioner who oversaw the department’s response to the 2013 marathon blasts.
Davis said the threat by homegrown terrorists “seems to be growing.”
James Alex Fields Jr., 20, of Maumee, Ohio, is accused of driving a Dodge Challenger into a crowd of counterprotesters Saturday during a white nationalists rally in Charlottesville, Va. Heather Heyer, 32, was killed, and 19 others were injured, authorities said.
Fields is charged with second-degree murder and three counts of malicious wounding and one count related to leaving the scene of the wreck.
National Security Adviser Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster said he “can confidently call it a form of terrorism.” The Department of Justice opened a civil rights investigation.
Carlos Arredondo, who famously aided severely wounded marathon survivor Jeff Bauman at the finish line in Boston, said what happened in Virginia frightened and angered him.
“Right now, the domestic terrorists are acting out,” Arredondo said. He said he’s concerned about the rally planned for the Boston Common this weekend and plans to counterprotest. “I will be there, to be one more voice.”
In another apparent example of political rhetoric turning violent, Republican U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise was seriously wounded after being shot while practicing baseball with other members of Congress. Gunman James T. Hodgkinson, who was fatally shot by authorities, was a former Bernie Sanders campaign supporter said to be disgruntled over President Trump’s election.
Former MBTA police officer Richard “Dic” Donohue, severely wounded in the Watertown firefight with the Tsarnaev brothers in 2013, said seeing the Charlottesville carnage “hit a personal note.”
“It’s sad and embarrassing that this sort of thing is happening in 2017 . ... There is so much hate going on. There has to be an end to it,” Donohue said.