Zavion Parker was getting off his school bus in Houston, Texas, when a group of five white teenagers forced him into a car and took him to an abandoned house, where they threatened to kill him.
The 13-year-old boy, who is black and said the abduction was racially motivated, was able to escape when the group went into another room to get what he thought was a gun. As the New York Daily News reported, the boy’s mother called police when he failed to return home from school and when she began to receive disturbing messages from his phone that detailed the plans the group had to kill the boy.
Parker told police that the group of white teenagers snatched him after he got off the bus, forcing him into a four-door car with flames painted on the side. He claimed that the group was led by a heavyset white man with a racial slur tattooed on his arm. The group took him to an abandoned house, beating him and stealing his jacket, shoes, phone, and keys, the New York Daily News reported.
The 13-year-old boy said he was able to run out of the abandoned house and was later spotted by a witness, Camecia Carmouche, who saw him running along the road barefoot with a torn shirt. As ABC 13 reported, Carmouche called police, who were able to rescue the boy.
Teen allegedly kidnapped and assaulted getting off school bus https://t.co/rnigdLsQNf pic.twitter.com/OP9okJPiZ9
— ABC13 Houston (@abc13houston) May 16, 2018
This is now the second unsolved hate crime in Houston in a matter of weeks. In April, a 31-year-old Muslim woman was stabbed in the arm in what authorities describe as an anti-Muslim attack. As the Dallas News reported, the woman said she was sideswiped by a man driving a red SUV. When the woman got out to check the damage on her car, the SUV driver pulled up behind her and began shouting at her, then brandished a knife and stabbed her in the arm.
The attacker was described as a white man in his mid-30s with tattoos on his arms and neck. Police did not say if the two incidents may have been related.
As police search for the suspects who abducted Zavion Parker, his mother is warning other parents to keep a close watch over their children.
