A New York man was indicted on hate crime charges Feb. 18, for allegedly calling a Sikh man “Osama” in Queens, before running him over with his pickup truck. Joseph Caleca, 55, of Setauket, is charged with attempted murder and felony assault, both as hate crimes, in connection with the July 30, 2014 incident.
Caleca, who was arrested Aug. 19 last year, was arraigned Feb. 18 on the nine-count indictment. He was remanded on continuing bail afterward, and is next due in court April 22, news reports said. He could face up to 25 years in prison if convicted.
“The defendant is accused of an unprovoked attack that allegedly began with the defendant driving by the victim and his friends and calling him a terrorist and ordering him to leave the country,” Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown said in a press release.. “After an exchange of words, the defendant allegedly struck the victim intentionally with his vehicle and dragged him along the street.”
Caleca was behind the wheel of his pickup truck at 99th Street and 101st Avenue in Ozone Park, Queens, when he got into a verbal argument with 29-year-old Sandeep Singh because Singh’s car door was blocking the street. Sandeep Singh, and his friend Baldy Singh, got into an argument with Caleca, Setauket, Long Island, following which the driver got back in his truck.
However, Sandeep Singh wanted the man to stop and call the police. So he ran then stepped in front of the pickup truck when the driver started his truck and ran over him. Sandeep Singh, a business owner and father, was reportedly dragged roughly 30 feet down the street and his body finally came loose from the truck, which kept on going.
Singh was treated at Jamaica Hospital Center for abdominal and back injuries following the attack.
Meanwhile, Caleca’s attorney, Murray Richman of the Bronx, told Newsday that his client “vehemently denies any racial component” and accused Brown’s office of “shaping the evidence” by basing charges on a portion of the video footage.
“It was my client who was initially assaulted,” he said.
A snippet of video obtained by media outlets last year showed the attack, but Richman said a fuller, four-minute video shows Singh and his group getting out of a bar and accosting motorists.