Black teen who fatally shoved Thai grandpa acquitted of murder
San Francisco Jury Acquits Man of Murder in Death of Thai Grandfather Vicha Ratanapakdee
A San Francisco Superior Court jury has acquitted Antoine Watson of murder in the 2021 death of Vicha Ratanapakdee. Instead, the jury found the 24-year-old defendant guilty of involuntary manslaughter.
This is a lesser charge that suggests he may soon be released from custody due to time already served.
Ratanapakdee was an 84-year-old Thai man whose fatal assault became a rallying cry for the movement against anti-Asian violence.
The verdict, delivered on Thursday, marks the legal conclusion to a case that shook the Asian American community.
January 2021, in the Anza Vista neighborhood, where security footage captured Watson running across the street and violently shoving Ratanapakdee to the ground during the elderly man’s morning walk.
Ratanapakdee struck his head on the pavement and succumbed to a brain hemorrhage two days later without regaining consciousness.
During the trial, the defense successfully argued against the prosecution’s claim of murder. The charge requires proof of malice or specific intent to kill.
Public Defender Mano Raju contended that Watson acted in a “haze of confusion and anger” and lashed out blindly without realizing the victim’s age or ethnicity.
The jury accepted this narrative, concluding that while Watson’s actions were criminal, they lacked the premeditated intent required for a murder conviction.
The decision has drawn renewed attention to the absence of hate crime charges in the case. Despite the attack fueling the global #StopAsianHate movement, prosecutors did not attach hate crime enhancements to the charges.
The San Francisco District Attorney’s Office noted that the legal threshold for such charges is high. It requires specific evidence of racial bias—such as racial slurs uttered during the attack—which was not present in this instance.
The conviction for involuntary manslaughter carries significant implications for Watson’s sentencing. The charge typically carries a maximum sentence of four years in prison.
Since Watson has remained in custody without bail for five years since his initial arrest, he has already exceeded the maximum potential sentence for his conviction.
Legal analysts anticipate his imminent release following a scheduled hearing on January 26 to address final sentencing details.
While the court case concludes with a verdict of involuntary manslaughter, the death of Vicha Ratanapakdee remains a pivotal moment in recent history.
His tragedy highlighted a surge in violence against Asian Americans, with the coalition Stop AAPI Hate recording over 10,000 incidents of discrimination and physical attacks across the United States between 2020 and 2021.
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