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(FOX NEWS) – The pro-Palestinian protester initially jailed on $1 million bond in the death of pro-Israel protester Paul Kessler will face hate crime charges only if investigators can determine that hate speech accompanied the blow that caused the Jewish man to fall.
Ventura County District Attorney Erik Nasarenko told reporters at a Friday press conference that the county’s Sheriff’s Department had interviewed 60 witnesses, reviewed more than 600 videos and put forth 2,000 work hours into their investigation of Loay Abdelfattah Alnaji, 50.
At his later arraignment in Ventura County Court, Alnaji pleaded not guilty – his bail amount was reduced to $50,000, and he was ordered to surrender his passports, Fox News Digital has learned.
“We have not ruled out a hate crime – an investigation into an alleged hate crime is ongoing,” Nasarenko said at the earlier press conference. “We are looking for whether the act was accompanied by hate speech, specific words . . . that show hatred toward a specific group. We don’t have that at the moment.”
The DA’s office was called in within 24 hours of Kessler’s November 6 death, Nasarenko said, which happened hours after the 69-year-old was struck by Alnaji amid a dispute at conflicting pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian protests on the corners of Westlake and Thousand Oaks Boulevards in Westlake Village around 3:20 p.m. on November 5.
