A Black father and daughter’s Memorial Day fishing outing took a bitter turn after they were met by a white man on a dock who threw large rocks at them and called them racial slurs.
Sheron Brown told MassLive.com about the incident on Lake Shirley in Lunenberg, Massachusetts, in which he and his 10-year-old daughter, Azaylia, were targeted.
Brown, a competitive fisherman who frequents the Lake Shirley area and is well known to the community, said he and his daughter picked up a pepperoni pizza on Memorial Day, then went to the lake to float, fish, and enjoy the day on his boat.
But their hopes for a nice afternoon together were snuffed out by a man authorities identified as 66-year-old David McPartlan, who questioned the family’s presence on the lake.
According to Brown, McPartlan came out of his lakeside home to ask Brown why he was fishing in a part of the lake near his house, asserting “that I shouldn’t be fishing there.”
Brown had driven his boat about 60 to 75 feet from shore, and although there were other fishing boats nearby, McPartlan only targeted Brown, telling him he would “have somewhere else to go fish,” and “shouldn’t be here,” Brown recalled.
When Brown replied he was there to fish with his daughter and told the man they’d stay far away from his property, McPartlan started swearing at him.
McPartlan allegedly told Brown that he “didn’t want them there,” told them to “go somewhere else,” and said, “You guys think you own the lake.”
Just as Brown was about to start recording the encounter, McPartlan threw a large rock, which landed just feet away from Brown’s boat.
In the cellphone video Brown filmed, Brown asked, “Did you just throw a rock at me?”
McPartlan yelled back, “Yeah, I threw rocks at you, [racial slur].”
McPartlan repeated the slur one more time. Then, after the video ended, Brown said he picked up a large stick.
Lunenberg police officers arrived shortly after Brown called 911. Court docs state that authorities have summoned McPartlan on two charges of assault with a dangerous weapon and two charges of assault to intimidate.
Brown said that when McPartlan started disparaging him, his daughter thought that she and her father had done something wrong. He said he’s worried about what kind of emotional or mental impact the incident will have on her.
“My daughter witnessed it, where someone calls her father that word … I’m forced to explain things to her when I may not be ready. I’m forced to explain something to her, under duress, after I choke back how I feel, what I may want to do,” Brown said, adding, “It upsets me, I’m not prepared. How do I prepare for that?”
Brown said that while the Lake Shirley community boasts a mostly white population, he has never experienced racism from any of the residents. The encounter with McPartlan was the first time.
“I don’t hold lake residents, white people, white males, anyone that fits within that category, accountable for one person’s actions. His actions are solo — he did this on his own,” Brown said. Brown added that despite that, “racism does exist.”
