Filed under: News, Profiles, Race and Civil Rights
Stories of alleged workplace racism, possible office theft and an angry and mentally disturbed black worker have filled the public's consciousness in the aftermath of the Connecticut beer warehouse shooting that took nine lives.
But for families and friends of the dead, on Sunday the focus returned to where it should be: the victims. Mourners held a candlelight vigil and offered prayers in a Manchester park to remember victims of Omar Thornton's killing spree at the Hartford Distributors Inc. warehouse last week.
Local religious leaders joined 500 people who wanted to remember the slain workers and bring some measure of closure to the small community outside Hartford.
Unfortunately, closure may take awhile due to the racial subplots that have angered some in the community.
Thornton, 34, a driver, called family members and even a 911 operator in the moments after he shot his coworkers to say that racism drove him to the killings.
Meanwhile, authorities and Hartford Distributors managers said no employees had ever reported any workplace discrimination to company officials.
Company officials have bristled at the notion that workplace racism was tolerated at Hartford Distributors and added that Thornton had been videotaped stealing beer from his workplace and was being dismissed from his job just before he shot up the warehouse.
The issues of violence and discrimination in the workplace have dominated talk radio since, but at least for one night, the focus was where it belonged - on the Hartford Distributor workers who were at the wrong place at the wrong time and paid for it with their lives.