A Sanford teen whose window was smashed while driving through a residential neighborhood plans to sue the men who damaged his car and confronted him.
16-year-old Jermaine Jones was heading to a friend’s house in the Lake Forest subdivision in Sanford when two men confronted him, ultimately throwing a rock through his rear window before telling him to leave the neighborhood.
In videos captured by Jones and a 911 call made by the teenager, Donald Corsi and Howard Hughes can be heard threatening him. He worried to a 911 operator that one of the men might have a gun and can be heard telling his friend to not confront the pair.
Corsi and Hughes were arrested following the incident. Both of the men were charged with criminal property damage. In the caption for the viral video of the incident, Jones said he believed the attack was racially motivated.
“I was racially profiled while driving through my friends neighborhood. They didn’t like the way I was driving, so they felt the need to hit my car with a cone, and throw a rock through my window,” Jones wrote. “All I wanted to do was de-escalate until police came, because I wasn’t about to get charges pressed on me for no reason.”
At Thursday’s news conference, Jones reiterated that belief.
“Especially because the lady in the video, she told me … that I was the one that would get a gun. She only said that because of the color of my skin. I don’t think … that if I was white, she would have even mentioned anything like that because I didn’t harm them. I didn’t make any threats to them,” Jones said.
Jones’ family said they were saddened by the events and that they planned to sue Hughes and Corsi.