The 17-year-old was on his way home from school, on FaceTime with a friend, when a stranger sat down next to him, pulled his earbud out of his ear and asked, “What trash are you speaking?”
Vergara is expected to be sentenced to five years in prison, Sierra said. It was unclear Tuesday whether Vergara had a lawyer. “He was really upset about the fact that no one helped him,” Mohtaseb added. “He kept repeating this thing: ‘I don’t understand why people didn’t try to stop him.’” The teenager was emotionally traumatized and has not been on the trolley since the attack, Mohtaseb said, adding that the teenager is being home-schooled until the end of the semester.
The teenager said that when his family moved to the United States, his brother experienced a hate crime that the family did not report. He said he did not want to stay quiet this time.The Partnership for the Advancement of New Americans, which was founded five years ago, works to resettle refugee families in the area, according to Ramla Sahid, the group’s executive director.