Justice Department launches civil rights investigation into Charlottesville violence

The car that allegedly rammed into anti-racist protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia

(Image credit: Win McNamee/Getty Images)

last updated 13 August 2017

The Department of Justice has opened a federal civil rights investigation into the violence at Saturday's white nationalist rally and counter-protest in Charlottesville, Virginia, that left three dead and dozens wounded.

"The violence and deaths in Charlottesville strike at the heart of American law and justice," said Attorney General Jeff Sessions. "When such actions arise from racial bigotry and hatred, they betray our core values and cannot be tolerated." Sessions reported the FBI is already working with state and local law enforcement at the scene.

A central focus of the Justice Department probe will be what eyewitnesses described as a deliberate vehicle attack on a crowd of anti-racist demonstrators. Authorities have arrested James Alex Fields Jr. of Ohio on suspicion of ramming his car into pedestrians, killing one, a 32-year-old woman, a paralegal named Heather Heyer, and injuring 19 more. At least 15 other people were wounded, and three other men were arrested on assorted charges related to protest violence.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Explore More

Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.

Subscribe to The Week

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox