SACRAMENTO, Calif. — With a hammer in hand, an unidentified person was captured on surveillance video smashing every single window at Vegan Deadly Sins early Friday morning.
"He didn't steal anything. He just smashed the window with the hammer and then he just walk away," said Nicole Pon, one of the owners of Vegan Deadly Sins.
This is the second time Vegan Deadly Sins, a Chinese-American owned restaurant in downtown Sacramento, has been targeted.
In September 2021, someone smashed several windows with a baseball bat while people were eating inside. During both vandalism incidents, nothing was stolen.
Pon's family owns and operates the restaurant, and she feels this was targeted and based on her family's race.
"For now, I'm living in fear, which is unfair, like why do I have to live in fear when I didn't do anything wrong?" Pon asked.
She also shared that on Valentines Day 2022 her husband was locking up their business when someone came up, punched him, and then kicked him. That person got away.
"I can't believe that I've been through this much," Pon said.
Earlier this month, a similar vandalism happened at Mountain Mike's Pizza in Citrus Heights. A person armed with a hammer broke every window.
"They didn't bust anything else surrounding my store. They only targeted, twice, my store," said Dave Brar, owner of Mountain Mike's Pizza in Citrus Heights
Also an Asian-owned business, Brar said he sees similarities in the two videos, and he said it could be the same person targeting both businesses.
"Vandalism against Asian American Pacific Islander businesses in Sacramento and nationwide are on a huge uptick. I mean, just in Sacramento for instance, the hate crimes towards our community have increased 300% since 2020. And I believe that these vandalisms, they are anti-Asian hate crimes," said Henry Chang, national executive director for the Asian Pacific Islander American Public Affairs Association (APAPA).
It is a troubling trend, but the APAPA hopes that more awareness and education can help stop the crime and violence.
"We just have the Senate Bill 1363, which is our K-12 initiative. It will educate students between kindergarten and 12th grade on the history of Asian American Pacific Islander community in California, and one of the main reasons for that is to help combat anti-Asian hate at its roots," Chang said.
As Vegan Deadly Sins cleans up with help from the community, they are leaning on other businesses to have a support system in place.
"We treat everyone like a family, because that's how we grow up... Everyone talks and supports each other," Pon said.
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