A disturbing letter threatening violence has police on alert and communities on edge. Irving Police said they’ve received just one report of the letter, but one is enough.
“Our criminal intelligence unit is working on this. Our investigators are working on this doing a lot of behind the scenes investigation. And we’re working with the postal inspector to see if we can try to find some of that, that could assist us,” said Officer Robert Reeves of Irving Police.
The letter was received at an apartment complex on Ranch View Drive in Irving.
It said American Citizens in the IT industry have lost their jobs to Indian and Chinese people, and that Indian and Chinese people have been asked to leave the country. The letter then goes on to threaten shootings at workplaces, communities, pools and playgrounds.
“When someone starts threatening violence or death or shooting or anything like that especially on playgrounds, it doesn’t matter what your nationality. Everybody either has kids or has young children in their family or has cousins or nephews or nieces, so that alarms everybody,” said Reeves.
Swati Shah of the India Association of North Texas said the letter made its rounds on social media and group chats.
“Something like this is definitely very disturbing because we don’t want to harm anybody, and we don’t want anyone to be harmed in our community,” said Shah.
Local
The latest news from around North Texas.
Abhijit Railkar, President of the India Association of North Texas, said some people feel understandably feel unsafe at the threat of violence, and that he’s most disturbed by the root cause of those threats.
“It’s like I’ve been here for thirty-plus years and these are my neighbors, and these are my friends, the people that I work with, and there’s still some level of animosity that we see,” said Railkar.
Irving police said they have increased patrol near the area where the letter was found and other parts of town.
“I can’t imagine the initial shock and fear that would go through you when you open and read this,” said Officer Reeves. “We don’t want people to think that the Irving police does not take any type of hate talk or hate rhetoric seriously because we do.
Irving police are asking anyone who received this letter to contact them immediately at (972) 273-1010.
