Global Courant 2023-04-21 18:47:50
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. (AP) — A southern Indiana woman now faces a federal hate crime charge alongside attempted murder in the stabbing of an Indiana University student of Chinese descent on a public bus.
Billie R. Davis, 56, of Bloomington, was indicted Thursday by a federal grand jury in Evansville on charges of intentionally inflicting injury to the victim because of her race and national origin, the Justice Department said. Her lawyer said she is mentally ill.
Davis, who is white, is accused of repeatedly stabbing the 18-year-old woman with a pocket knife on January 11 while the victim, from Carmel, Indiana, waited to get off a bus in downtown Bloomington.
Citing court records, WRTV-TV has reported that Davis told police she stabbed the woman in the head multiple times with a pocketknife because it would be “one less person to blow up our country.”
Asian Americans have increasingly been the target of racially motivated harassment and assault in recent years, especially since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, and many are concerned about it anti-Asian rhetoric linked to fraught US-China relations can lead to more violence.
An affidavit from a detective who viewed bus surveillance footage says the victim was stabbed approximately seven times in the top of the head, the Indianapolis star reported.
“Davis then folds the knife, puts it back in her pocket, and returns to her seated position on the bus,” the affidavit said.
Surveillance footage showed no interaction between the two women prior to the attack.
A witness who was on the bus followed the woman’s attacker and contacted police. Davis was later arrested and charged with attempted murder and aggravated assault, according to court documents.
She pleaded not guilty to those charges in January.
Kyle Dugger, an attorney representing Davis, said in a lawsuit in January that he is filing an insanity defense on Davis’ behalf and that she is “unable to help prepare for her defense due to mental illness.”
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Dugger told The Associated Press in an email Friday that with the federal indictment, he expects the state-level charges to be dismissed and Davis transferred to federal custody.
“Ms. Davis has a long, documented history of severe mental illness,” he added. “She sought help managing her condition through the day of the alleged attack.”
Davis was “extremely disorganized” and was “unaware of why she was being locked up” during the police interview, where it is alleged that she confessed to her racist motive, Dugger said.
“Davis continued to hallucinate in jail for several days after he was arrested,” he said. “People close to Ms. Davis — neighbors, family, friends — do not describe her as having known racist attitudes or history. They do not recall her expressing racist views or engaging in hate speech.”
