The state known as the first to hold a political caucus is the home of a white woman who barreled over a 14-year old girl because she thought she was Mexican.
Police in Des Moines, Iowa, charged the woman from the city of Clive with attempted murder after she confessed to intentionally running over a girl because of her ethnicity, the Associated Press reported Friday.
Nicole Marie Poole Franklin, 42, admitted to steering her SUV onto a sidewalk on Dec. 9 and running over the teenager as she walked to school to watch a basketball game.
Franklin then fled the scene, police said.
Franklin reportedly made several derogatory statements about Latinos during a police interview in which she admitted she intentionally ran over the youngster, who was identified as Natalia Miranda.
The assailant was already in jail on a separate assault charge when police interviewed her about the hit-and-run.
She was accused of making racist remarks to a West Des Moines convenience store clerk and customers and throwing items at the clerk during the assault incident, which occurred the same day as the vehicular homicide attempt.
The teenager suffered a concussion and severe bruising in the heinous incident.
“I don’t remember the impact,” Miranda told Des Moines television station KCCI in the days after the crash. “I just remember the car coming at me.”
Authorities said she is expected to make a full recovery.
“I mean, in the most energetic terms possible, that there is no place in our community (or any other) for this kind of hatred and violence. We are committed to supporting the victim and his family and working diligently with them to seek justice.,” Clive Police Chief Mike Venema wrote on the department’s Facebook page.
The 2020 Iowa Democratic caucuses will take place on Monday, Feb. 3, 2020, as the first nominating contest in the Democratic Party presidential primaries for the 2020 presidential election.