Multiple Asian American Families Receive Threatening Letters: "If You Don't Leave, More People Will Be Killed"

Recently, Asians in Salt Lake City, Utah, have been the target of racial discrimination and frequent hate attacks, with several Asian residents receiving threatening letters.

An Asian-owned restaurant in Salt Lake City, Utah, recently received a voicemail message threatening with profanity, ABC4 reported in January. Many local Asian-American residents also said they received threatening letters with hateful connotations. According to police, the letter said "Asians should go back to where they came from or more people could be killed." Not only that, but a woman of Vietnamese descent also found the threatening letter in a crack in her apartment door. Police later learned that several Asian residents living on the same floor as her had also received the same letter.

In response to such alleged Asian hate mail, Salt Lake City police have launched an investigation. According to local Unified Police Department Officer Melody Cutler, "We're going to find the person who sent the letters, and each letter could have different potential evidence." She said forensics is looking closely at the threatening letters for clues that "this was a threat made to a collective, a hate crime. We take these types of incidents seriously and we want them to be reported as well."

Salt Lake City police said they have had no reported cases involving Asian hate crimes in the past decade, but they are aware that such cases do occur from time to time. They urge victims or witnesses of such cases to report them promptly to prevent more victims.