It’s quite surprising. The group supporting Hamas, which caused chaos and violence targeted at Jews during the incident at Columbia University’s Hamilton Hall in 2024, demanding divestment and chanting “Free Palestine,” inadvertently harmed and victimized people of color, whom they claim to represent. Two minority janitors, Mario Torres and Lester Wilson, who were trapped, held hostage, and attacked during the event, have now taken legal action against those responsible.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg dropped 31 of the 46 charges filed against these protestors, so this lawsuit is poetic justice.
Torres and Wilson, represented by Torridon Law and the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, filed a lawsuit in federal court. They accuse over 40 Columbia students and some external instigators of terrorizing them into the early hours of the following day, physically assaulting them, imprisoning them against their will, and insulting them as ‘Jew-lovers’ and ‘Zionists.’
The pro Hamas mob attacked two non Jewish janitors at Columbia, calling them “Jew lovers,” as they beat them and held them against their will.
It raises a valid question – why do some individuals continue to support the violent group that harmed minority workers like Torres and Wilson, instead of standing with the victims? [Link to tweet for reference]
— Joel M. Petlin (@Joelmpetlin) April 26, 2025
Certainly flips the script on “oppressed” and “oppressor.” Marxism hardest hit.
The janitors were working the night shift as heavy cleaners. What were they cleaning? The New York Post reported that the janitors were forced to scrub the swastikas that had been spray-painted in the building. They had no idea they would encounter an even worse nightmare of being held hostage by masked agitators, who spewed obscenities and threatened them with violence:
As reports indicated, these professionally organized protests were funded primarily by George Soros’ Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), US Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR), and other left-wing concerns. If Wilson and Torres win this lawsuit, Soros and his fellow travelers can pony up money to pay for their legal fees as well as the pain and suffering they have caused them. Hopefully, they’ll never have to scrub a swastika, or anything else, ever again:
“Too often, the mainstream media creates a false narrative about innocent political protesters who are simply trying to advance a peace agenda, and who are getting punished, when in fact, what we’re seeing is organized activity by groups who support the terrorist agenda of Hamas and who are engaged in outright violence,” [Ken Marcus, founder of the Brandeis Center] said. “These cases demonstrate that the campaign against campus antisemitism isn’t about speech and free expression, but rather an effort to curtail the extreme violence that is unleashed at some of our most prestigious institutions when administrators look the other way.”
Wilson and Torres have also filed a complaint against Columbia University with The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. We’ll keep you posted.
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