Berkeley Police Arrest Woman On Hate Crime Charge For 2nd Time This Year
BERKELEY (CBS SF) – A woman is facing hate crime charges for the second time this year following an attack on two women in Berkeley last week.
According to Berkeley Police, the victims were walking near Telegraph and Durant avenues south of the UC Berkeley campus around 4 p.m. last Friday when they walked by the suspect near an ATM.
When one of the victims made eye contact, the suspect cursed her and her Asian ethnicity, police said. She then threw water bottles at both women before walking away.
Officers found the suspect a short time later and made an arrest.
"The commission of a hate crime is a serious offense, which will not be tolerated in the City of Berkeley," police said in a statement.
The suspect, identified as 56-year-old Antoinette Archimede, is currently being held at the Santa Rita Jail in Dublin.
The Alameda County District Attorney's Office has charged Archimede with willfully threatening a person based on their perceived characteristics, using offensive words in public and battery.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Archimede was arrested by Berkeley police in January for a separate hate crime. In that case, police said she pushed a woman off a curb and made hateful statements about people of Mexican descent.
According to jail records, Archimede is scheduled to be arraigned on Thursday.