According to police, a Texas woman tried to drown her three-year-old – probably a hate crime

The girl’s mother told police that the suspect, 42-year-old Elizabeth Wolf, “made statements about not being American and other racist remarks” and that she tried to kidnap her two children last month, Euless police said in a statement.

“The Euless Police Department believes the crime was committed due to bias or prejudice, and that is part of the case filed with the Tarrant County District Attorney’s Office,” Captain Brenda Alvarado said in an email Monday. The District Attorney’s Office is reviewing the case, spokeswoman Anna Tinsley Williams said in an email.

Police responded on May 19 to reports of a disturbance at the pool of an apartment complex in Euless, a suburb of Dallas and Fort Worth.

The 32-year-old mother told officers that Wolf asked her where she was from and if the two children playing at the pool were hers, a police statement said. Wolf then grabbed her 6-year-old son, the mother told officers, but police said “he pulled away from her grasp, resulting in a scratch on his finger.”

“The mother tried to help her son when Wolf grabbed her three-year-old daughter and forced her under water,” police said.

The mother managed to pull her daughter out of the water, police said. The daughter “screamed for help and coughed up water.” Both children were medically examined by paramedics on site, the police said.

Wolf, who was initially arrested for public intoxication, was also charged with assault on a child for allegedly injuring the girl’s 6-year-old brother, police said. Wolf could not immediately be reached for comment and it was not clear whether she was represented by an attorney.

In a press conference on Saturday, the Texas chapter of CAIR said the incident occurred while the girl’s mother was wearing a hijab and modest swimwear.

In a statement shared by CAIR, the mother said: “We are American citizens, originally from Palestine, and I don’t know where to go to feel safe with my children,” adding that she and her family are “facing this hatred here” amid Israel’s war in Gaza.

“My daughter is traumatized,” she said.

Following the deadly Hamas attack on October 7 and Israel’s subsequent war in Gaza, reports of threats or incidents of prejudice against Muslims and Jews increased in the United States. Human rights groups have said, although federal statistics show that hate crimes against both groups had been on the rise even before the war. It was not immediately clear whether the Euless incident was in any way related to the Middle East conflict.

“We are witnessing a new level of bigotry here: a person deeply believing that they can decide which children deserve to live and which do not, based on their religion, the language they speak and their country of origin,” Shaimaa Zayan, CAIR-Austin’s director of operations, said in a statement.

Texas Rep. Salman Bhojani (D), whose district includes the city of Euless, said in a statement: “Hate has no place in Euless, in District 92, or anywhere else in our great state. I want to thank the Euless Police Department for quickly arresting the suspected provocateur, and I offer my support to the family affected.”