An elderly Black man suffered a broken eye socket and facial fractures after an alleged attack by his neighbor in Newark, New York.<\/p>\n
A 70-year-old Newark, New York<\/a>, man is recovering from a brutal assault that his family says was preceded by weeks of racial harassment from a neighbor. News10NBC<\/a> reported that Johnny White was left with a broken eye socket, facial fractures and stitches over his ears after the attack. Reporter Erin Mahon noted that two of White\u2019s daughters stayed by his side overnight, taking turns checking on him in the emergency department.<\/p>\n According to the outlet\u2019s coverage, the daughters said the accused, identified by police as Brandon Watt, had been harassing their father for weeks leading up to the incident, something police confirmed they are actively investigating. One daughter described her father to News10NBC as a man who \u201cwould give you the shirt off his back,\u201d adding that he goes to work every day and loves his animals.<\/p>\n Police say Watt now faces charges that include endangering the welfare of a child \u2014 since his own daughter was reportedly present at the time of the assault \u2014 along with criminal possession of a weapon. News10NBC reported that Watt was booked into Wayne County Jail following his arrest.<\/p>\n Newark\u2019s police chief told the outlet he is not ruling out the possibility that the attack was racially motivated, but said confirming that will require speaking directly with White once he is well enough to give a statement.<\/p>\n As of the report, investigators had already interviewed Watt and two witnesses and reviewed video evidence connected to the assault, and officials noted that charges could still change pending White\u2019s account.<\/p>\n White\u2019s daughter spoke candidly to News10NBC about the broader reality the family feels the incident represents. \u201cThere\u2019s really still hate out there, and people really solely just hate because you\u2019re Black,\u201d she said. \u201cEverybody needs help, everybody needs love and everybody needs family. We shouldn\u2019t be just going onto somebody\u2019s property and abusing them.\u201d<\/p>\n The family has publicly maintained that the assault was fueled by racial animus, even as authorities continue working to determine whether the case will ultimately be classified as a hate crime.<\/p>\n More must-reads:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An elderly Black man suffered a broken eye socket and facial fractures after an alleged attack by his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":286402,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[18595,109691,109692,109693,109690,109689,9,11,10,7607,109694],"class_list":["post-286401","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-alleged-attack","tag-brandon-watt","tag-broken-eye-socket","tag-erin-mahon","tag-facial-fractures","tag-johnny-white","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-newark","tag-racial-harassment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286401","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=286401"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286401\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/286402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=286401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=286401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=286401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}