Grandma Xiao Zhen Xie with an ice pack and a two by four.

San Francisco retiree and Grandma Xiao Zhen Xie told authorities she was just waiting at the traffic light on Market St. when a man punched her in the eye.  She ended up defending herself quite well though, by the time the police got there it was her 39-year-old attacker who was on the stretcher and heading to the ER.

Video after the assault (it is heartbreaking):

Just came upon an attack on an elderly Asian woman on Market Street San Francisco. Effort I got more details pic.twitter.com/5o8r0eeHE2

— Dennis O'Donnell (@DennisKPIX) March 17, 2021

Little is known about her attacker, his motives, or his mental acuity, what we do know is Xiao Zhen Xie is a 26 year resident of San Francisco, she has heart breaking emotional and physical injuries from the attack.

Xie’s attacker left the scene handcuffed to a stretcher and bleeding from the mouth. It seems pretty clear he is mentally ill, I mean, the guy doesn’t even have shoes on.

In the video Xie is yelling at her assailant in Chinese, saying, “why did you hit me you bum!”

Surrounded by her family yesterday evening, the 76-year-old told CBS KPIX 5 through a translator that she was quite shaken up and that the attack was completely unprovoked. Her immediate instinct was to fight back.

“Very traumatized, very scared and this eye is still bleeding,” Li told KPIX 5. “The right eye still cannot see anything and still bleeding and we have something to absorb the bleeding.”

Xie’s family has set up a GoFundMe account to help with her medical expenses.  As you can see by the photo provided by the family her injuries are severe, not to mention the emotional damage from being assaulted on the street.  The Gofundme page also mentions that Xie is a cancer survivor and a diabetic.

Image of Grandma Xie’s injuries

“Help my grandmother recover from this trauma” GoFundme Here.

San Francisco police said they are investigating the aggravated assault. The incident happened at Market St. and Charles J. Brenham Place near McAllister St. at around 10:30 a.m.  Although it is not clear if this assault was racially motivated, it is pretty clear that assaults (physical & verbal) against Asian Americans have increased severely over the last year.

According to a national report conducted by Stop AAPI Hate, over the past year there have been nearly 4,000 hate incidents against Asians across the U.S. and 45% of those attacks were in California.

Graph shows types of discrimination reported by Asian in America over the last year.  view the full report here.

According to KPIX, hate crimes against Asian Americans rose 150% in 2020, even as hate crimes overall declined. In January, a 91-year-old man was shoved to the ground in Oakland’s Chinatown. An assault in San Francisco killed 94-year-old Vichar Ratanapakdee, while another assault left 75-year-old Pak Ho dead in Oakland last week.

Most recently, 59-year-old Danny Yu Chang was severely beaten on San Francisco’s Market St. on Monday, leaving him with serious injuries.

We really need to do better as a country, and a people.