FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

March 2, 2011

For more information contact Jill Garvey 312-266-0319 or visit www.newcomm.org

Chicago – The Center for New Community, a national civil rights organization, today released a report entitled Storm Warning. The report chronicles the arc of hatred that spanned the last decade in idyllic Suffolk County, New York, and ended in the tragic murder of Ecuadorian immigrant Marcelo Lucero.

“For communities now on the front lines of the immigration debate, Storm Warning is a grave reminder of the trouble that follows the influence of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR),” according to The Reverend David Ostendorf, Executive Director of the Center for New Community. “FAIR is an anti-immigrant organization that was instrumental in the burgeoning of hate in Suffolk County”

“For locales immersed in anti-immigrant activity, it will hopefully serve as a wakeup call to what lies ahead,” Ostendorf said, “and inspire urgent courage among those who desire to counter that activity.”

When the Center for New Community was invited to Suffolk County, Long Island ten years ago to work with community and religious organizations in their emerging efforts to counter harsh anti-immigrant activity, there were already red flags warning of the potential for violence.

“The kids of Suffolk County soaked up the rhetoric and rationale for immigrant bashing from adults who were adept in the practice,” Ostendorf stated. “As a result, Marcelo Lucero was stabbed to death. The hatred that had been brewing for years took life itself.”

It was clear that national restrictionist organizations, in tandem with local anti-immigrant activists, were planting the seeds of hatred in Suffolk County.

The Center for New Community encourages individuals concerned about the rise in violence against immigrants to share this report widely, so that together we might stem the wave of unchecked hate that consumes the lives of both perpetrators and victims.

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