Active, ongoing investigation of bias crimes targeting Asian Americans

SEATTLE — Investigators are looking for a suspect they say is targeting Asian Americans.

According to Seattle police, the suspect began attacking several Asian restaurants Saturday before targeting people at Golden Gardens Park.

Now there is a heightened sense of alert at the park since KIRO 7 broke this story.

The only image of the suspect is a picture taken at a Thai restaurant in Ballard Saturday night before he was spotted at Golden Gardens Park.

In each case, the suspect targeted those he met of Asian descent.

Joanne Fung looked at the picture of the person of interest. She said he didn't look familiar.

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"No, he doesn't," she said. "I've seen him, that same picture actually, on social media."

Fung, her husband and their 4-year-old daughter were on an outing at their neighborhood park.

"Told he is singling out Asians, asking if they are 'Chinese,'" she said.

"I mean, I think that's terrible. And hopefully, I don't have a run-in with him," she said.

The employees at Thai Thani Restaurant in the heart of Ballard said they had run-ins with him twice.

"Just opened the door and yelled, yelled, yelled at us," said Tonya McCabe. "And he said, 'Like are you Chinese?' "

McCabe said Friday night, he accosted her.

"And I said, 'If you're not going to leave, I'm like going to call 911,' " she said. "And then he said, 'Better f***ing call 911.' "

He returned the next night when Natthiya Chumdee was working.

"And I said, 'No, I'm not Chinese. I'm Thai,'" Chumdee said she told the man, "Everyone here is Thai."

Last week, another man was taped shoving an Asian couple as they walked by. They told Seattle police he spat on them, too.

The person of interest in these latest attacks is a white male, 5 feet, 10 inches tall, in his mid-20s to mid-30s, with a muscular build. He was wearing a white shirt and shorts.

He, too, is accused of spitting on at least one Asian man he met at Golden Gardens Park Saturday night.

All of it is unsettling to Joanne Fung and her husband.

"We should be better than that, all of us, right?" said Martin Lundgren. "Education, education, education. Thought we were past this."

"I hope that's not something that I have to deal with or anyone I know," said Fung. "And I think it's terrible."

Seattle police have assigned all of these cases to the bias crimes unit.

They say they want very much to catch the people involved in all of these crimes.

Anyone who recognizes any of them is asked to call 911.

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