He said they had “good, strong physical evidence” and were not ruling it out from being a hate crime.
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“It was about hate”, the Rev. Dr. Raphael Warnock, Ebenezer’s senior pastor, said in comments to the press Thursday.
Two former Georgia prosecutors said it might be tough to prosecute the people responsible.
In Atlanta, one of the flags was placed under a banner a that read “Black Lives Matter, Hands Up” an anthem taken up by protesters in the wake of a spate of police killings of unarmed black men.
Two of the nation’s most powerful civil right organizations wanted to sit down with Governor Nathan Deal and begin talking about removing Confederate symbols not only in Georgia, but also the nation. Another grim moment from the Atlanta church’s past occurred June 30, 1974, when King’s mother, Alberta Williams King, was shot and killed inside the church.
King once preached at the historic church, which is near the new church where the flags were placed.
Confederate flags have been placed at the King Center before.
In comparison with waving flags on private property, the surreptitious placing of the flags at a historic civil rights site is more vexing.
Even though there were no witnesses to the crime, authorities hope the video camera at the church will help federal and local police identify the assailant and any accomplices.
He says this act was about hate and not heritage.
“Let the message go out that we will not be shaken by this”, Warnock said at a morning news conference.
Police say a maintenance worker saw the flags at 6 a.m. and contacted a federal park ranger, who then notified law enforcement.
The Atlanta Police Homeland Security Department and the U.S. Park Service are investigating the incident.
“We have seen this kind of ugliness before, not just in the 1960s but in recent years, we’ve received calls in recent weeks, threatening calls with severe racialized language and slurs”. If you would like to discuss another topic, look for a relevant article.
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Be Civil – It’s OK to have a difference in opinion but there’s no need to be a jerk. “We have to push against it by condemning this act, and we have to push against it by making sure that people have voting rights”.
