Cafe Owner Recalls Baumhammers Punch

Baumhammers Trial: Day 5

A French cafe owner told jurors that two years ago mass shooting suspect Richard Baumhammers punched her, violently snapping her head back into a counter, because he thought she was Jewish. Shooting Spree

The Trial:
Day 5:

Parisian Cafe Owner, Police Chief Testify
Day 4:Officer James Mann Testifies
Day 3:Sandip Patel Testifies
Day 2: Day 2: Testimony Continues At Baumhammers' Trial
Day 1: Day 1: Baumhammers Trial Opens
Almost 1 Year Later, Baumhammers Trial Begins

Survey: Can Baumhammers Be Tried Fairly In Allegheny County?
Plea Bargains Offered
Did He Research Alleged Victims?

Pre-Trial Stories:
Suspect Ruled Competent
Mourners Gather At Synagogue
Suspect Arraigned
Victim's Kin
Woman Has Close Call
Hear Baumhammers' Personal Ad

Rabbis Call For End To Violence
D.A. Says Note Could Reveal Hate Motive
Who Is Richard Baumhammers?

Vivianne LeGerrac, the owner of Le Relais Littre in Paris, said that Baumhammers was in the crowded cafe less than three minutes before striking her. "I was walking by the bar and he hit me in the forehead with his fist," LeGerrac said through an interpreter Wednesday. LeGerrac told the jury that Baumhammers was in the cafe a day earlier for three hours, staring at her and a waitress who worked there. Paris police Capt. Alain Andre said that Baumhammers told him that he hit LeGerrac because he thought she was Jewish. During the fifth day of testimony, prosecutors tried to establish a pattern in which Baumhammers physically or verbally attacked people because of their ethnic backgrounds. On Wednesday, prosecutors also introduced inmates of the Allegheny County Jail who said that they met Baumhammers while he was held there. Inmate Leslie Haun, 36, is in the jail waiting for a sentence for a robbery conviction. He testified Wednesday that he met the defendant when Baumhammers spotted his tattoo of a confederate soldier while Haun was using a jail phone. Haun said that after their introduction, Baumhammers gave him articles about race relations, and even offered to autograph the articles, saying that his autograph may be worth something someday. "He felt he had found a kindred spirit," Haun said. Baumhammers, 35, a nonpracticing immigration attorney from the Pittsburgh suburb of Mount Lebanon, faces the possible death penalty if convicted on charges of the racially motivated shootings of six people, five of whom eventually died, on April 28, 2000. Prosecutors contend Baumhammers was a frustrated white supremacist who opposed nonwhite immigration and took matters into his own hands when efforts to form a like-minded political party went nowhere. Baumhammers' attorneys contend he is mentally ill and not responsible for his actions. They said he believed that the FBI was following and shooting lasers at him, and that he somehow melded a dislike of immigrants into those delusions after reading an anti-immigration book a couple of years before the shootings. Prosecutors on Wednesday also called to the stand a Pakistani doctor who said that Baumhammers chased him out of a fast food restaurant in August 1999 after Baumhammers heard him speaking Hindi to a friend. Dr. Sarfraz Ahmad said that he was sitting in a suburban Burger King when Baumhammers began slamming a table with his fists yelling, "Leave this country or you will die!" Baumhammers was accompanied by a man who had a pistol tucked in his belt when he approached Ahmad's table, the doctor said. Ahmad and his friend ran out the front door of the restaurant and looked back to see Baumhammers chasing them, he said. The two men lost Baumhammers by hiding in a nearby department store, he said. Baumhammers also is charged with shooting at and defacing two synagogues during the 72-minute spree through Allegheny and Beaver county communities south and west of Pittsburgh. He is also accused of ethnic intimidation, Pennsylvania's version of a hate crime. The victims were Anita Gordon, 63, Baumhammers' Jewish next-door neighbor; Anil Thakur, 31, an Indian man; two Asian men, Ji-Ye Sun, 34, of Churchill and Thao Pham, 27, of Castle Shannon, at a Chinese restaurant; and Garry Lee, 22, a black man from Aliquippa, at a Beaver County karate school. Sandip Patel, 26, another Indian man, was paralyzed by a gunshot that hit his spine while working at the Indian grocery store where Thakur was killed. Testimony was delayed Wednesday morning as attorneys argued about an evidence question. Prosecutors wanted to admit into evidence a videotape documentary in which prominent hate group leaders are interviewed. They said that the tape was available on hate group Web sites that were visited on a computer at the home of Baumhammers' parents, where the suspect lived. Allegheny County Judge Jeffrey Manning may not rule on the issue until later in the trial. He said that looking at such Web sites is not illegal and that videos Baumhammers viewed before the shootings may not be relevant. Baumhammers' attorneys said that the evidence is unfair to Baumhammers and that it is meant to incite the jury against him. Allegheny County Judge Jeffrey Manning wrapped up the day by ruling on what computer information can be included into evidence. Manning ruled that prosecutors can show the jury what police found on Baumhammers' computer hard drive shortly after the shootings. Previous Stories: