Everett family frustrated after car tagged with racist graffiti

Everett family singled out with hateful message

A family in Everett had to buff out hate from the hood of their car, after a stranger spray-painted a racial slur on their vehicle.

EVERETT, Wash. - A family in Everett is frustrated and confused by racist graffiti on the hood of their car.

"It's literally just hate and it's frustration, you know, that's just directed towards the world in general," said resident Kari Veenstra.

Thursday night, someone decided to single out this Everett family.

"The one kid just jumped out real quick, ran over here, I don’t think he was here 10 seconds 15 seconds max," said resident Lynn Smallwood. "And he ran back with a car and they took off."

"I obviously I don't think that we were targeted directly," said Veenstra. "I don't know if somebody else was? Or if they were? I don't know. I can't tell you what was going through their minds."

Their home camera picked up a dark-colored, two-door Ford Explorer—but the plate is too blurry to distinguish.

"I mean they just got out of their vehicle in the center of the road and just sprayed," said Veenstra.

Whoever the suspect is, they left a racial slur spray-painted across the hood, one that initially went unnoticed.

"I wake up, have my coffee, I watch a little bit of the news. At 6:50, 6:20, 6:30, I come out the door, I always go around the back of the Suburban to get in, I get in on the driver's side. And I leave for work," recalled Smallwood. "I’m going about my day until just before lunchtime. One of the guys from one of the supervisors comes upstairs to where I'm working. And he says, 'You need to go look at your car.' And I said, 'Why?' And I thought he was joking at first. He says, 'No, you really do need to go look at your car.'"

Right on the hood of the car—a slur in dark spray paint, taking up the width of the hood.

"I mean, that was at our work, you know, and it was in on the side of a busy, you know, parking lot in Mukilteo," said Veenstra. "And I don't know how many people, you know, drove by that day and saw that. And it's just like, gosh, it's terrible."

Thanks to the efforts of coworkers who had access to just the right solvents at a metal shop, the hateful slur buffed right out.

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But still, as Everett Police look for the suspect, a beautiful start to the weekend was disrupted by hate.

Everett Crime and Public Safety