Community Rebuilds Muslim Teen’s Memorial Set Ablaze in Dupont Circle
By Daniel Gil/Contributing Writer
On a scorchingly hot Wednesday in Washington, DC, people stroll through Dupont Circle and stop to read signs surrounded by flowers memorializing a teen killed over the weekend.
Seventeen year old Nabra Hassanen was reportedly murdered Sunday morning while walking from a mosque in Sterling, VA with a group of friends at around 3:00 am when an altercation with a motorist led to her death. 22 year old Darwin Martinez Torres, the suspect being charged with the teen’s murder, allegedly got out of his vehicle and chased the group down with a baseball bat before attacking Hassanen. She was then forcibly taken to a nearby area where her body was found in a pond, according to police who have ruled out the incident as a hate crime and are investigating whether or not she had been sexually assaulted.
A memorial vigil was held for Hassanen Tuesday night in Dupont Circle, Washington and other major cities across the country. However, at around 8:30 the next morning, DC fire officials responded to a small blaze at Dupont Circle. Hassanen’s memorial had been set on fire. Police arrested 24 year old Jonathan Solomon of South Carolina in connection with the fire though they had no evidence to suspect the crime was hate or racially motivated.
Bouquets of flowers and signs sat scorched in the morning heat, but as the community began learning what had happened, the flowers returned in droves.
Sophie Hersher and her friend Sandi Kleinman carefully laid flowers down by a sign which asks, “Am I going to get beaten to death with a baseball bat? Am I going to get shot while I’m praying at the mosque? Am I going to get run over crossing the street after prayer? Am I going to get shot over a parking spot? Am I next?”
Hersher lays her flowers down at the memorial
Hersher is part of an interfaith women’s organization called Salam Shalom and, along with Kleinman, decided to pay her respects to Hassanen in response to the fire.
“We gathered flowers from our office garden,” she said as onlookers stopped to admire the memorial gradually growing more colorful.
Alex Dodds, who works for a nonprofit in Washington, heard about the blaze on twitter. She went out of her way to buy pink roses which she laid down at the memorial because, “the daisies at the store seemed too light hearted.” She continued by saying, “the incidents of hate targeted at Muslims was compounded by the fire was not only an insult to Hassanen, but also to the community.”
The teen’s death came during a week where violence against Muslims has made international headlines. On monday, a man plowed his car into a group of Muslims leaving their mosque in London, killing one and injuring 10. The man was reportedly yelling anti-Muslim slurs after striking the crowd.
A donation page was set up for Hassanen’s family, which has already received almost $350,000 in donations and garnered more than 12,000 supporters.
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