Thai Viet Phan, who was recently elected to the Santa Ana City Council, was stunned when she received the advisory notice from the Buddhist temple she attended growing up.
Huong Tich Temple had been vandalized and Santa Ana police had deemed it a hate crime. It was the sixth temple to be vandalized in the area in the last month.
Outside the temple’s entrance, 15 stone Buddha and Bodhisattva statues were defaced with black spray paint. On the back of one read “Jesus” vertically down the spine.
“It’s beyond trespass. It’s beyond vandalism. It’s a hate crime targeted at the Vietnamese American Buddhist community, and we will not stand for that,”Phan told reporters at a news conference held outside a temple in nearby Westminster on Saturday.
Read the full story on LATimes.com.
