A TRUCKER who allegedly stabbed a man in a hate crime has said he did it because he “doesn’t like black people,” court papers have revealed.
Nolan Levi Strauss, 26, was indicted for stabbing Ronnell Tyrone Hughes, 48, in December 2019.
Hughes was applying for a job at an Arby’s restaurant at the Pilot Travel Center in Ontario, Oregon, when Strauss approached him from behind and stabbed him in the neck, according to prosecutors.
The victim managed to break away from Strauss as he was being held by an Arby’s employee with a belt.
Hughes suffered from two stab wounds to the neck and was “bleeding everywhere,” according to a probable cause affidavit obtained by The Oregonian, and had to undergo emergency surgery.
The employee then asked Strauss why he attacked the man, to which he replied it was because he was black and “I don’t like black people,” federal prosecutors said.
Strauss, who worked for a trucking company at the time, also told cops that he intended to kill Hughes, according to an affidavit.
The attacker, who had a history of mental illness and stopped taking his medication, faces up to life in jail if he is convicted.
