After receiving several racist packages in recent weeks, Terry Williams experienced the unthinkable: his San Francisco home set ablaze Tuesday.
Though Williams — a professional dog walker and lifelong resident in his Alamo Square neighborhood — wasn’t home at the time of the blaze, he shares the home with his elderly parents, who were rescued by firefighters. The fire follows the discovery of two packages on April 26 and May 5 that contained racist epithets, according to The San Francisco Standard.
“It was a plastic bag that had ‘Gangster,’ ‘thug’ and other negative words about Black people on it,’” Williams told Per KGO-TV, an ABC San Francisco affiliate. He also told the network that the bag had a photo of him in it with racist slurs written on it as well as a doll with a noose around its neck.
Authorities are looking into who sent the packages and determining if they are connected to the fire, but have yet to identify a suspect.
At the time of the blaze, Williams was meeting with city officials. His father, Luddie, told the The San Francisco Standard about the panic and shock he experienced. “I don’t know what happened,” Luddie Williams said. “I was just trying to get me and my wife the hell out of there.”
The pair were taken to a local hospital. The Williams family has lived in San Francisco’s Alamo Square neighborhood since the 1970s. For the last several decades, the city’s Black residents have left as gentrification and housing costs forced them to seek out more affordable areas.
“I feel like I should have been here. I could’ve stopped it,” Terry Williams stated. “My parents are elderly and then something like this happens. It’s my worst nightmare.”
A GoFundMe campaign to help the Williams family install security cameras on their property exceeded its $10,000 goal Tuesday.