VENTURA, CALIF.
Vidal Fregoso will be sentenced next month for using racial slurs and threatening a 72-year-old Black man on a chartered fishing trip, officials stated.
On August 31, 2020, prosecutors stated that a jury found Vidal Fregoso ,50, of Camarillo, guilty of committing a hate crime against Luther Swayne, a 72-year-old African American.
The jury also found Fregoso guilty of additional charges of committing attempted vandalism and attempted theft.
Fregoso faces up to one-year confinement in the Ventura County jail.
On September 25, 2019, Fregoso approached 72-year-old Luther Swayne while on an overnight offshore fishing charter originating in Ventura County.
Fregoso used racial slurs and threatened to physically harm Swayne. A witness observed Fregoso attempt to throw Swayne’s fishing pole overboard.
The boat’s crew intervened and separated the parties until the fishing boat came back into the dock. Several days after the incident, the Ventura County Sheriff’s Office conducted an investigation into the incident and ultimately arrested Fregoso, according to prosecutors.
Fergoso will be sentenced on Oct 5, prosecutors stated.