Balbir Singh Sodhi

Balbir Singh Sodhi was a Sikh gas station owner in Mesa, Arizona, who was shot dead on 15 September 2001, four days after the attacks of 9/11, by a man who mistook him for an Arab Muslim because of his turban and beard. The UC Davis Punjabi and Sikh Diaspora Digital Archive says that he was the first victim of a hate crime in the aftermath of 9/11, and PRI's The World calls his murder the first known hate-driven murder after 9/11.

His life: Wikipedia, used here for his life story because the other sources opened do not give it, says he was born on 6 July 1949 in Jalandhar, Punjab, emigrated to the United States in 1989, worked in Los Angeles and drove a taxi in San Francisco, then moved to Arizona and bought a gas station with his brother. PRI says he was shot while planting flowers in front of his store.

The killing and the trial: PRI reports that Frank Silva Roque shot him five times in the back. On 11 September, PRI says, Roque had told a waiter that he was going to go out and shoot people he called by a racial slur. Roque was sentenced to death, and the sentence was later reduced to life in prison. A report of August 2006 says the Arizona Supreme Court unanimously found that Roque's mental illness and low IQ were mitigating factors and commuted the sentence to life without parole, Vice Chief Justice Rebecca White Berch writing that he should be imprisoned for the rest of his natural life. Wikipedia says Roque died in prison on 11 May 2022.

The family: PRI reports that Sodhi's brother Rana Sodhi has held a memorial on 15 September every year since 2002. In 2016 Rana spoke by telephone with Roque; Roque said he was very sorry for what had happened to his brother, and Rana answered that the family had already forgiven him. PRI adds that another brother, Sukhpal, was shot dead in San Francisco a few months after Balbir.

Key moments

• 11 September 2001: the 9/11 attacks; Roque makes his threat.
• 15 September 2001: Sodhi is shot dead.
• 2006: the Arizona Supreme Court commutes Roque's death sentence to life without parole.
• September 2016: after his yearly memorial, Rana Sodhi speaks by telephone with Roque.

What he is remembered for: as the first known fatal victim of the backlash after 9/11. The UC Davis archive adds that the Sikh Coalition has received over 1,000 reports of hate crimes, violence, school bullying, workplace discrimination, and racial and religious profiling against Punjabi Sikh Americans since 9/11.