Racially Motivated Assault Results in a 4-Year Sentence
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A white man was sentenced Thursday to four years in prison for a racially motivated assault against a black man.
Walter Dean, 30, who also goes by the name of Walter McNarney, pulled a knife on a black man who was accompanied by a white woman near a 7-Eleven store in Ocean Beach on April 28.
Dean, of San Diego, pleaded guilty to assault with a deadly weapon and to depriving the black man of his civil rights.
Deputy Dist. Atty. Luis Aragon said Dean was a member of a white supremacy group while he was in prison before. Two of his three previous convictions involved pulling a knife on someone, said Aragon. Dean was on parole when the attack occurred.
Dean yelled racial epithets at the man and has “a strong anti-black” belief, Aragon said. The couple were not physically injured, the prosecutor told San Diego Superior Court Judge Thomas Whelan but now feel a new concern about being in public places.
“This is an issue that affects all of us,” Aragon said.
Neither victim was in court.
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