Greek Court Sentences 6 in Beating Death of American Tourist, Austin Native Bakari Henderson
Six people have been convicted and three exonerated in connection to the beating death of American tourist Bakari Henderson in Greece last year.
CBS News reports that the Austin native had recently graduated from the University of Arizona with a degree in business finance when he and friends took a trip to the Greek island of Zakynthos for a photo shoot in 2017.
While in a bar, Henderson was approached by a woman who reportedly wanted a selfie with an American. A Serbian man reportedly commented that there were plenty of Serbs present, and the woman shouldn't be talking to a black man. The man struck Henderson, after which a brawl erupted and spilled into the street, where Henderson was fatally injured by a crowd of men.
According to CBS News, nine people were charged - seven Serbians, one Greek, and a British man. Charges against three of the defendants were dropped, and a court in Patras found the six remaining defendants guilty of various assault charges. Their sentences range from five to 15 years in prison.
Henderon's family and Greek prosecutors are not satisfied, and an appeal has been filed. They hoped to see murder charges filed and life sentences handed down, believing the attack to have been purely motivated by race.
"You should not be able to chase a man down and beat him to death and not go to jail," Henderson's mother, Jill, told CBS News. "His face was bruised and swollen to the point where we put sunglasses on him when we buried him."