White Racist Gets a Slap on the Wrist in Fatal Stabbing of Black Man
A Black man was killed in a racially motivated stabbing outside a liquor store in Kansas City. And according to the Kansas City Star, the white suspect was handed charges… but for disturbing the peace, not for taking someone’s life.
Jon “Mike” Rone Jr. got into an altercation with Sean Tonkin outside Liquor Land, located around the eastern border of Kansas City, Mo. Authorities say Tonkin used the N-word “in a hateful and racially motivated tone” toward Rone. Surveillance camera footage showed Rone armed with a club walking around the side of the store behind Tonkin, then stumbling back, uttering, “he stabbed me,” before collapsing on the floor.
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Police said Tonkin was found with blood splatter on his clothes and carrying a folding knife with an American flag on the handle. Witnesses and Rone’s relatives say Tonkin was looking to “kill a n***er.” But when he was arrested by Independence officers, they only charged him with a misdemeanor count of disturbing the peace.
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Jackson County prosecutors continue to weigh additional state charges as they “examine who started the incident, what weapons were used by the people involved and Missouri’s law on self-defense,” Mike Mansur, a spokesman for the Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office, said in a statement to The Star.
“These factors will direct whether further State charges regarding Mr. Rone’s homicide can be filed,” Mansur said, adding that the community “is rightfully angered by the disturbing racial comments of the defendant.”
This is the second time recently that a racist got away with attacking a Black person. Keren Prescott was spat on by a white woman during a 2021 Black Lives Matter demonstration, per NBC News. Prescott and Yuliya Gilshteyn got into a “all lives” versus “Black lives” shouting match when the woman spat in her face and walked away. What was a hate crime charge (and could’ve been plain assault and battery) was dismissed by a judge Friday.
Gilshteyn entered a special probation program for first offenders requiring 100 hours of anti-hate instruction, per the report.
Every state’s hate crime unit may be just a few years old, but what’s the purpose of having these agencies if white people aren’t prosecuted for targeting Black folks? In the courtroom, racism is still regarded as an attitude or opinion instead of the source of criminal intention.
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