SPOKANE, Wash. — Officials with the city of Coeur d'Alene are speaking out about the city attorney's decision to not charge the man who yelled racial slurs at a visiting women's basketball team.
Mayor Jim Hammond said he is disappointed the suspect, 18-year-old Anthony Myers, won't face any legal accountability for his actions. The mayor added he does not want to undermine the prosecutor's decision, but hoped Myers would face some level of accountability.
According to a report from Ryan Hunter, the Chief Deputy City Attorney, there is not enough evidence to establish probable cause "as to every element of any of the potential offenses without reliance on First Amendment protected speech." Essentially, the report said there is not enough evidence to prove every aspect of the suspect's alleged offenses, and the prosecutor's office can't use speech protected by the First Amendment to criminally charge someone.
The alleged racial incident continues to impact the community, according to Hammond. Immediately following the incident, he said he received letters from people who changed their mind about vacationing to Coeur d'Alene this summer. He said this hurt the community and the local businesses.
"I had hoped that something could be done to hold them accountable, and to help them be aware of it," Hammond said. "It may have been funny to them, but it wasn't funny to the community. And it was harmful in many different ways.”
Christie Wood, the vice president of the Kootenai County Task Force on Human Relations and Coeur d'Alene City Councilmember, said she is also disappointed no charges will be filed, but said she respects the review of the incident by the prosecutor. As a former law enforcement personnel, Wood said this incident had its legal challenges from the beginning.
"In this case, they really had difficulty even locating witnesses and they finally were able to do that," she said. "And then they had hours and hours of video surveillance to comb through and audio. And so it's just very labor intensive. And then, of course, the chief sent them to Utah, the detectives, to actually interview some of the victims and witnesses."
In this case, Hammond said a few people created a lot of damage in the Coeur d'Alene community. He added the community must continue standing up against unwelcome behavior moving forward.
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