The family of one of the Cincinnati brawlers claimed the only reason the fight has garnered so much attention was because the person punched in the face is a white woman.
Jermaine Matthews, 39, and Montianez Merriweather, 34, were initially charged with aggravated riot and assault after the massive brawl in the streets of Cincinnati, Ohio, went viral this week.
Matthews, however, was hit with three more charges on Thursday – two felonious assault and one assault charge.
Outside of court, two relatives of Merriweather told WLWT that the race of the victims had catapulted the case to national attention.
‘If it was an African American woman who got knocked out… We wouldn’t have been going through all this,’ one of the women said.
Another woman, believed to be Merriweather’s mother Clarissa, said her son is an honor roll student with ‘a biracial child’ as she denied he was racist.
‘He’s not a racist,’ she said. ‘It wasn’t like they’re thugs… these Russians was walking down the street and on the video he said “you wanna mess with these Russians?”‘
‘He smacked the first guy… my child is in school, he has five kids, he’s on the B honor roll in school.’
Two men and a woman were charged over their involvement as horror images emerged of a female victim with black eyes and a swollen, bruised face.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14960747/cincinnati-brawler-family-racism-allegations.html