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Black Indiana Doctor’s Home Vandalized, Car Blown Up By KKK

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A family in Indiana says they were the victim of  a vicious hate crime. Tom, Sybil and J. Anthony Brown go ‘Inside Her Story’ with Dr. Myla Bennett, a doctor in Indiana who woke up one morning last week to the unimaginable.

“I was awakened out of my sleep by a boom, I wasn’t really sure what the sound was,” Bennett says. It was about 5 a.m. “Then I heard and explosion and it made the house shake. Then I got up and went into my living room but I could see an orange glow. My husband parks his truck in the driveway so I made the assumption that it was his truck on fire.

It was minus 16 degrees outside so we couldn’t just run out. So we were trying to bundle up the kids before the truck explode and once we made it outside safely, and got to the front of the house, that’s when we saw spray painted on one of the garage doors Move N—a Doctor and on the smaller door KKK spray-painted in red paint.”

Bennett is a who lives in Richmond, Indiana, about an hour from Indianapolis, an upscale suburban community is a well-known plastic surgeon who advertises via billboards around the city. Her husband’s truck was totaled, and Bennett says fire marshals told her the only reason it didn’t take the house with it is that it was so cold.

Bennett, who has lived in the city of about 30,000 for 3 years was surprised by the attack, because the city has an African-American population of about 30% and its fair share of interracial families.

“Part of why I’m trying to reach out to more people is that they are still saying “alleged” hate crime,” says Bennett. “That was clearly a note to me directly and they signed it with KKK and who blows up vehicles in people’s driveways and it was clearly directed toward me.

My neighborhood is predominantly white but my family is African-American in that neighborhood and there’s one other guy. My children play with those children. My son turned 4 a few weeks ago and all those kids were there.”

Bennett says that people who say it could have been a prank are missing the point. She was clearly targeted and even if it was kids, Bennett believes that still makes it a hate crime.

“They could have blown my house up,” she says. “It took them two hours to extinguish the fire. It incinerated the interior of the truck so badly that everything was gone. There was no evidence to collect because it was burned so badly.”

Bennett says that unless the culprits are caught, she is afraid to go back home. She and her family are currently staying at her mother’s home.

“I’m not going to put my children’s lives in jeopardy when we don’t have a point to prove,” Bennett said.

Click the link above to hear the entire interview!

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Jacque Reid

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