The brutal murder of a Detroit man in 1982 inspires decades of activism by Asian Americans across the country

Two white auto workers beat 27-year-old Chinese-American Vincent Chin to death with a baseball bat during his bachelor party in Detroit in 1982. His relatives’ cries for justice, however, fell on deaf ears.

Twelve days passed before any media reported on Chin’s killing by men who blamed Asian manufacturers for the decline of the city’s main auto industry, and no one at the time acknowledged the racism in his killing. The defendants pleaded guilty to manslaughter and were sentenced to three years’ probation. District Judge Charles Kaufman argued: “These are not the kind of men you send to prison.”

This injustice spurred Asian Americans to unite across racial and cultural lines. Hundreds protested the outcome of the trial in downtown Detroit. Chin’s mother traveled the country, telling his story and pushing for federal charges for civil rights violations.

More than four decades later, activists are still fighting to ensure that Chin is not forgotten. His story is inspiring nationwide activism. Law students are reenacting his trial, Hollywood is adapting his story for a film, and Asian Americans are remembering the impact of his killing on their fight for racial justice and equality.

“For a whole generation of Asian American activists, the Vincent Chin case was the reason they got involved,” says author and filmmaker Curtis Chin. “It was the reason they sat down at the negotiating table.”

A choir of Asian-American voices

After the judge spared Vincent Chin’s killer, Curtis Chin, then 14, grabbed his parents’ typewriter and wrote outraged letters to newspaper editors. He had found his calling.

Instead of taking over his family’s Chinese restaurant, Curtis Chin – who is not related to the man killed on June 23, 1982 – spent the next 30 years giving Asian Americans a voice and telling the story of Vincent Chin and racism in 1980s Detroit.

For Helen Zia, an Asian American activist who moved to Detroit in the 1970s, Chin’s case exposed the blatant injustices her community faced.

In the absence of local organizations advocating for the civil rights of Asian Americans, Zia co-founded American Citizens for Justice, which helped secure a federal trial for Chin’s killers. One of them was acquitted of civil rights charges, and the other was sentenced to 25 years in prison. His conviction was overturned on appeal.

On June 20, the FBI released a 602-page file on Chin’s death, which included previously unpublished witness statements describing his final moments and anti-Asian slurs from his attackers. Activists told the Detroit Free Press, which first reported on the FBI documents, that they had not been informed of the file and the agency did not provide a reason for its release.

Last year, Zia founded the Vincent Chin Institute, an advocacy organization to combat hatred against Asian Americans.

Chin’s case has had an impact far beyond advocacy. Harvard Law School students have reenacted the trials of his attackers to highlight the shortcomings of the legal system. And his murder has inspired documentaries, a podcast and the film “Who Killed Vincent Chin?”

Vincent Chin was the victim of brutal racist violence, but from this tragedy emerged “a chorus of Asian American voices,” says Curtis Chin.

There is still a lot of work ahead of us

The auto workers who attacked Chin blamed foreign vehicle manufacturers for the difficulties of the U.S. auto industry.

This fear of a foreign economic threat has parallels to modern-day “anti-China hysteria and scapegoating,” says Cynthia Choi, co-founder of Stop AAPI Hate, pointing to attacks on Asians by people who accuse them of complicity in the Covid-19 pandemic.

“The difference for our community today is that we are speaking out. We are speaking out loud,” Choi says.

Stop AAPI Hate, founded in 2020, advocates for policy change and collects comprehensive data on hate crimes against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. The group has documented thousands of cases nationwide, including verbal and physical abuse, as well as economic and educational discrimination.

“Nearly 50% of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders reported experiencing some form of racist hate in the past year,” Choi says.

Supporters say there is still much to be done.

There is no comprehensive history of Asian Americans included in the core curricula for grades 1-12. When asked in a recent survey to name a prominent Asian American, most Americans answered, “I can’t think of one” or Jackie Chan, who is not American.

“For most Americans, we don’t even exist,” Zia says, citing lack of visibility as one of the main reasons Asian-American stereotypes are maintained.

John Yang, president and CEO of Asian Americans Advancing Justice, emphasizes how damaging stereotypes are.

“When it comes to job opportunities, we’re labeled as perpetual foreigners,” Yang says. “Asian Americans don’t get promoted at the same rate. We don’t occupy executive positions. We don’t sit on boards like other Americans.”

Discrimination also occurs in the housing market. The Urban Institute, a think tank that conducts economic and policy research, reports that Asian American buyers are shown 18.8% fewer properties overall than white buyers. However, the stereotype of Asian Americans as a model minority leads some fair housing advocates to exclude Asian Americans from their efforts.

“Everyone is concerned about whether an Asian American is really an American, and that’s why they’re not shown the same homes,” Yang says. “They’re not given the same opportunities.”

Standing on the shoulders of giants

On Sunday, dozens of residents stood with their heads bowed beneath the gate to Boston’s Chinatown to remember Chin. They wore T-shirts that read “STOP ASIAN HATE,” arranged candles in the shape of a heart and displayed a portrait of Chin with his name written in Chinese and “May 18, 1955 – June 23, 1982.”

Wilson Lee, co-founder of the Chinese American Citizens Alliance Boston Lodge and the Chinese American Heritage Foundation, said he and his wife have organized a vigil for Chin every June 23 for the past six years. Even as media attention has waned, their commitment to Chin’s memory has remained undiminished.

“We’re in this for the long haul,” says Lee. “Because it’s the right thing to do, not because it’s popular.”

A group of local dignitaries attended the memorial, as did 16 Asian American elementary and high school students, whom Lee referred to as “stakeholders,” who held orange lilies and yellow flowers to their chests.

“We need to make sure that future generations, especially our young people, learn about the experiences he went through,” Lee says. “They are standing on the shoulders of giants, and Vincent Chin was a giant.”

___

The Associated Press receives funding from the Sony Global Social Justice Fund to expand certain coverage areas. All content is solely the responsibility of AP. AP’s standards for working with charities, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas can be found at AP.org.