Iranian-American Beaten by Unknown Suspects

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The New York Sun

MATINECOCK — An Iranian-American nail salon owner was brutalized by robbers who called her a “terrorist” and scrawled anti-Muslim messages on a mirror in her shop, the victim and police said.

“I’m in shock,” the victim, Zoreh Assemi, told WNBC-TV after the attack Saturday morning, a web of cuts and bruises visible on her face, arms, and hands. She said she felt “terrorized … not by American people, but by a very small group and prejudice. And it hurts.”

Nassau County police, who were treating the attack as a bias crime, had made no arrests early Sunday and were appealing to the public for tips.

Two men sneaked up on Ms. Assemi, 52, as she was getting ready to open the Givan Nail and Skin Center at 6:30 a.m. Saturday, police said. The attackers pushed her into the store and kicked her, pounded her hand with a hammer, and slashed her with what may have been a box cutter, police said.

“One of them was just beating me up with a stick, and the other one was cutting,” Ms. Assemi, who said she is a naturalized American citizen, told WNBC.


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