Incident in Cardinal Gardens not a hate crime, LAPD says

The Los Angeles Police Department has concluded that the racist incident in Cardinal Gardens should not be treated as a hate crime, according to a statement from Vice President for Student Affairs Ainsley Carry on Thursday.

The incident will be handled by the Office of Student Judicial Affairs and Community Standards. In the statement, Carry said that the University would be unable to provide further details of the proceedings as disciplinary records are protected under federal law and because students have a right to confidentiality .

“Thank you for understanding our obligation to comply with federal law and protect student privacy,” Carry said.

Ivan Tsang, a sophomore majoring in business administration, was sitting outside a fireplace in Cardinal Gardens on March 6 when another student shouted racial slurs and threw eggs at him from a balcony in the building. Tsang, who is originally from Hong Kong, posted about the incident on Facebook, which gained attention on both social and national media.

The Los Angeles Times reported that the student later reached out to Tsang on Facebook and apologized. The student said that he was also Asian and was intoxicated at the time of the incident.