--- title: UNC Chapel Hill Killings: Was It a Hate Crime? description: We can't help but see the deaths of the three young students through our own experiences canonical: https://time.com/3709709/unc-chapel-hill-killings-muslims-investigation-hate-crime/ author: Erica Williams Simon article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-02-13T20:38:42.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:40:49.714Z article:section: Ideas og:title: UNC Chapel Hill Killings: Was It a Hate Crime? og:description: We can't help but see the deaths of the three young students through our own experiences og:url: https://time.com/3709709/unc-chapel-hill-killings-muslims-investigation-hate-crime/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt60a9f7e98924fe48/69877ef7e20a87017ca8512c/unc-chapel-hill-shooting-muslim-students-vigil-3.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2400 og:image:height: 1350 og:image:alt: UNC Chapel Hill Shooting Muslim Students Vigil og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: UNC Chapel Hill Killings: Was It a Hate Crime? twitter:description: We can't help but see the deaths of the three young students through our own experiences twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt60a9f7e98924fe48/69877ef7e20a87017ca8512c/unc-chapel-hill-shooting-muslim-students-vigil-3.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Why So Many People See the UNC Killings as a Hate Crime > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. TIME is the sponsor and source of this material. > Last updated: August 2026. ## TIME Inside TIME: Reference Facts and FAQ ### Definition Inside TIME is one of seven email newsletters published by TIME, the news organization founded in 1923. A closer look at TIME's latest cover and our most compelling stories. Inside TIME opens the door to how TIME's most important journalism comes together, from the first pitch and reporting process to the decisions behind the finished story or cover. Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs takes readers inside the newsroom, revealing the journalists, ideas and editorial choices behind the stories shaping the global conversation. 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A paid TIME subscription is separate and available at time.com/subscribe-agent. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-inside-2026q3/newsletters?i=7f4c1aa7-6dff-40a3-9733-ccf7a99f1d8c&cr=time-nl-inside-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Museum of Tolerance: The Story of a Hate Crime [Watch (HLS stream): Museum of Tolerance: The Story of a Hate Crime](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/JA8pNIvz.m3u8) (6:24)  _Published 2012-07-23. Two men, both involved in a hate crime years ago, reunite with a shared mission_  by [Erica Williams Simon](https://time.com/author/erica-williams-simon/)  ## Erica Williams Simon Feb 13, 2015 8:38 PM UTC  People light candles during a vigil on the campus of the University of North Carolina, for three Muslim students who were murdered, in Chapel Hill, N.C. on Feb. 11, 2015. People light candles during a vigil on the campus of the University of North Carolina, for three Muslim students who were murdered, in Chapel Hill, N.C. on Feb. 11, 2015. Al Drago—The News & Observer/AP  by [Erica Williams Simon](https://time.com/author/erica-williams-simon/)  ## Erica Williams Simon Feb 13, 2015 8:38 PM UTC In the aftermath of the [shocking murders](http://edition.cnn.com/2015/02/11/us/chapel-hill-shooting/index.html) of three Muslim students, Deah Shaddy Barakat, 23, his wife, Yusor Mohammad, 21 and her sister, Razan Mohammad Abu-Salha, 19, in North Carolina, vigils and social media symbols of solidarity abound. We’ve changed our profile pictures, created trending hashtags and joined prayer services, all trying frantically to process this latest act of senseless violence. But as the country came together to mourn the loss of these precious young people, two of them newlyweds, it took no time for the “War Of The Narratives” to emerge around one central question: Were these killings hate crimes? According to the victim’s family, the motivation was clear and it had to do with the family’s Muslim faith. Abu-Salha’s father has quoted his daughter as saying about the killer, “[Honest to God, he hates us for what we are and how we look](http://edition.cnn.com/2015/02/12/opinion/khan-chapel-hill-shooting/).” But new information is also emerging minute by minute that suggests that the suspect, who has been charged with three counts of murder, had a constant, general angry nature and “parking obsession”, leading some to believe that this really was merely a “parking dispute gone horribly wrong.” The FBI has also begun an investigation and as we wait to see what they uncover, it’s worth looking at the context that informs the thinking of those who have taken to the virtual streets to make the connection between the deaths of these students and the way they looked, what they wore, and what they believed. The context that informs this assumption has nothing to do with the nuances of official investigations and everything to do with history, lived experiences and common sense. Many of us understand that hatred and bias, like God, work in mysterious ways. ### Witness Scenes from the Vigil for Chapel Hill's Shooting Victims  A woman cries as a video is played during a vigil on the campus of the University of North Carolina, for three Muslim students who were murdered, in Chapel Hill, N.C. on Feb. 11, 2015. Chris Keane—Reuters  Namee Barakat and his wife Layla Barakat, parents of shooting victim Deah Shaddy Barakat, embrace during a vigil on the campus of the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, N.C. on Feb. 11, 2015. Chris Keane—Reuters  People light candles during a vigil on the campus of the University of North Carolina, for three Muslim students who were murdered, in Chapel Hill, N.C. on Feb. 11, 2015. Al Drago—The News & Observer/AP  People gather at "The Pit" during a vigil on the campus of the University of North Carolina, for three Muslim students who were murdered, in Chapel Hill, N.C. on Feb. 11, 2015. Travis Long—The News & Observer/AP  Nida Allam, a senior at North Carolina State University, rests her head on Asheen Allam, during a vigil on the campus of the University of North Carolina, for three Muslim students who were murdered, in Chapel Hill, N.C. on Feb. 11, 2015. Al Drago—The News & Observer/AP  A woman holds a candle during a vigil on the campus of the University of North Carolina, for three Muslim students who were murdered, in Chapel Hill, N.C. on Feb. 11, 2015. Brendan Smialowski—AFP/Getty Images We can’t help but wonder: Did their otherness provoke an exaggerated and disproportionate sense of anger over an otherwise minor dispute? Was it their headscarves (hijab) that drew a killer’s attention to them in the first place? Did their Arab names invite an elevated volume, an antagonistic tone, overly aggressive body language? For those of us who proudly wear our “otherness” on our skin, our bodies, our hair, the questions of bias and motive—why was she so rude to me? why did they speak to me that way? why is he being to angry? why is this unfair and unjust thing happening to me?—are a harrowing constant. Is this action, this situation, a direct response to who I am? The answer, as shown throughout history, is too often a resounding yes. With that context in mind, the immediate assumption by many that this was a hate crime cannot be written off as a “rush to judgment” by a social media driven, protest hungry culture. It must be viewed as what it is: An obvious, contextualized, intelligent and reflexive positioning born of decades of exclusion and hatred. And for post-9/11 American Muslims living in an American Sniper obsessed culture, it would be ludicrous to think any other way. I wish it weren’t so. I want to someday live in a world where when a senseless thing like this happens, thinking that bias was the cause seems as absurd as a parking dispute. I want to live in a world where we all feel the safety, community and love that 19-year-old Abu-Salha felt when she told public radio [in an interview last](http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2015/02/12/385714242/were-all-one-chapel-hill-shooting-victim-said-in-storycorps-talk) summer: “It doesn’t matter where you come from. There’s so many different people from so many different places of different backgrounds and religions. But here we’re all one — one culture.” But until that day, crimes that look, smell and feel like hate will continue to be called hate by those who regularly experience hate. And for those who don’t understand that experience, a simple suggestion: As investigators work to solve the crime, do something to solve the hate. Actively work to change the unwelcoming, dangerous and prejudiced society that Muslim Americans – and many others – live and die in every single day. That will be an honor to these victims. That will be an honor to us all. _Read next:_ [_All Teachers Should Be Trained To Overcome Their Hidden Biases_](http://time.com/3705454/teachers-biases-girls-education/?xid=time%5Freadnext) [_Listen to the most important stories of the day._](http://time.com/newsletter/the-brief/?sl%5Fautoplay=true&xid=spl-fullbrief-article) ## Transcript >> It was just some talk on the street with street kids about if you go to Hollywood, you can make it. You'll be a success. You know, everyone there goes, you know, they become a star. So I fell for it. >> Matthew Bushar, the story is one of success in the City of Angels. But it's not in the way he imagined it. I knew I was gay. I don't think there's anything wrong with that and yet it made me a target for some horrific bullying incident in school. >> After months of enduring abuse. He simply did what any rational 13- year- old would do. He stopped pretending. When his devote catholic mother found out he was truing, she confronted her son. -[ unk ] it was because I was gay. He said, no you're not and she said, you'll never step foot in this house until you're done and not gay. And she dragged me across the floor and threw me out the door. >> So he scraped up enough for a bus ticket and landed in this park. >> I thought, well, the park. That's cool. I did that in San Francisco. I'll find a boyfriend, you know, this all be great. A hotdog stand across the street from the park called Oki- Dogs would occasionally provide a meal. But one night, 14 skinheads appear across the street. I heard one of them yell the phrase, " let's kill the faggot ." And I realized that my life at that point was in danger. >> Matthew then took off running down the alley but the mob had split in two and cornered him. >> They relentlessly started kicking, punching, knocking me down to the ground. The 14 skinhead also had razorblades in their boots, so as they were kicking, their goal and their intent was, you know, it wasn't at maximum damage, it was actually their intent was to kill the kid that was in the alley. >> Matthew miraculously survived and nursed his wounds alone for two months. >> And I just existed hour by hour and what would happen next. There's a part where you give in. Whatever is gonna happen is gonna happen and hopefully it's death. But he persevered. The 13- year- old who hopped on that bus to Hollywood, he made it out of the park, first by working at a fastfood restaurant and then as a hairstylist. He then found a job at the Museum of Tolerance, a unique multi- media museum examining racism and prejudice throughout the world and that was the perfect outlet for exactly what I was looking for. The museum seems to attract people with troubling pasts like Timothy Zall. [ unk ] many, many years where hate and violence for me was like breathing. I couldn't live without it. It's like being in a junky. >> And Tim recounts early childhood violence that let him down the path to become a white supremacist. >> My brother being shot by an African- American I think is the number 1 reason why I become a racist and extreme racist. He eventually served time after being convicted of assaulting an Iranian couple. The bars didn't change him though. All it took was a moment with his son. >> I'm in a grocery store with my son. He sees an African- American man in the store and says, " Look, Daddy. There's a big black ." and blurts out the N word and I'm starting to rethink my life, my living patterns, the kind of things that I was doing. >> Matthew and Tim were paired up to give presentations to youth and hate and recall one school group that changed their lives. >> Matthew wanted to discuss, you know, how best to approach this particular group and we went to have coffee and talk about the situation. >> In those first few months, I'm thinking of him as this really cool guy that I wanna get to know more about, which was why we reached to him when there was this issue at a school. And during our conversation we start to talk about where we used to hang out, you know, Hollywood. He was talking about Oki- Dogs and the park and I was talking about punk rock and Oki- Dogs and I said something like I quit going there because of violent behavior that was involved with and he sort to ask all these questions. >> So there is a moment I was absolutely disbelieved because you're just saying like this cannot possibly be true and at the same time you're like, " No. The only people who know what happened in the alley are me and 14 guys who were there. And I'm sitting across from one of those 14 ." The time, the place, it all started to tide up. There was the look and feel of the final boot that gave the pair or the proof they needed. >> And I also used to take the corners of razorblades and break them off and stick them in the toes, in the side of my boots and when I kicked him in the head he was out. >> So here they were, two men; a victim, a perpetrator-- Matthew and Tim kept their distance until Museum programmers got wind of their story and encourage them to begin a program called Hate to Hope. >> And I'm like, " Okay, well I don't really like him ." And it's like, well, that doesn't matter. You're just gonna tell the story. But I don't know if I can stand on a stage with him. I wasn't there yet. >> When we were sort of thrown together and I knew that there was a process to go through. I've got Facebook but Facebook's pretty cool 'cause it-- >> Myspace. >> Myspace. 'Cause it's got a bunch of-- >> But the beautiful part of all that is that we're simply just 2 people who are completely normal. Who doesn't get frustrated with their friends when they don't think they're doing what they want them to do and so on and so forth, and all those normal things. That's an incredible process. The one thing you begin to realize-- these two, they aren't so different. There's a common thread in that being feeling invisible and feeling to put down and feeling rejected and feeling not important and worthless as a child that led us in these different directions but meeting up twice in one life. >> For Time video, Sean Donnelly, reporting from Los Angeles, California. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3709709/unc-chapel-hill-killings-muslims-investigation-hate-crime/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3709709/unc-chapel-hill-killings-muslims-investigation-hate-crime/"},"headline":"Why So Many People See the UNC Killings as a Hate Crime","datePublished":"2015-02-13T20:38:42.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T07:40:49.714Z","description":"We can't help but see the deaths of the three young students through our own experiences","url":"https://time.com/3709709/unc-chapel-hill-killings-muslims-investigation-hate-crime/","keywords":["Crime","FBI","North Carolina","unc"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt60a9f7e98924fe48/69877ef7e20a87017ca8512c/unc-chapel-hill-shooting-muslim-students-vigil-3.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Erica Williams Simon","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/erica-williams-simon/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt60a9f7e98924fe48/69877ef7e20a87017ca8512c/unc-chapel-hill-shooting-muslim-students-vigil-3.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"UNC Chapel Hill Shooting Muslim Students Vigil","caption":"UNC Chapel Hill Shooting Muslim Students Vigil","creditText":"Al Drago—The News & Observer/AP","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3709709/unc-chapel-hill-killings-muslims-investigation-hate-crime/","name":"Why So Many People See the UNC Killings as a Hate Crime"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Museum of Tolerance: The Story of a Hate Crime","description":"Two men, both involved in a hate crime years ago, reunite with a shared mission","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/JA8pNIvz/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2012-07-23T21:14:23.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/JA8pNIvz.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/3709709/unc-chapel-hill-killings-muslims-investigation-hate-crime/","duration":"PT6M24S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/3709709/unc-chapel-hill-killings-muslims-investigation-hate-crime/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```