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Washington woman exposes herself to Asian woman's son and calls her 'war bride', sued for $100K

Jan Myers, 72, who called Thi Pham a 'slant eye', a Vietnamese war-bride 'bought' by her husband, and exposed her genitalia to Pham's son, 2, was sued after she made a threat against her life

KING COUNTY, WASHINGTON: An Asian American woman has filed a lawsuit against her racist neighbor who exposed herself to her two-year-old son, news outlets reported on Thursday, August 18. Attorneys for the Shoreline family filed the lawsuit Tuesday alleging the neighbor, a White woman, and the harassment was caught on video.

Anti-Asian crime has been extensively tracked by MEAWW, with incidents skyrocketing in 2021, owing largely to the coronavirus situation. Last month, a Florida restauranteur who owns a ramen place was astounded when three drunken men were seen hurling insults at him. A 75-year-old woman was punched in the face in New York City in May, resulting in a broken nose and fractured eye socket. Gregory Jacques was tased and arrested in NYC on April 7 after he assaulted an Asian 7-11 store employee.

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The lawsuit against the White woman for the newest reporting of hate crime described an incident from last April, when Thi Boa Tran Pham, 33, was working in her garden. Pham claimed her elderly neighbor, Jan Myers, began harassing her, and that she immediately took out her phone and began recording the incident, capturing what she saw as a threat to her life.

'Without provocation'

Jan Myers, 72, is the neighbor who was recorded making racist insults in Shoreline, Washington, according to Pham, a Vietnamese woman. In one incident, the older woman is shown in censored footage naked from the waist down. She had allegedly exposed herself to both Pham and his 2-year-old son, reported Law and Crime.

“Without provocation, Defendant Myers has on multiple occasions including, but not limited to: on April 5th, 2021 sought Plaintiff Thi Boa Tran Pham out without invitation and made racially derogatory and threatening statements to her, including threats against her life,” said the complaint obtained by the website.

'You're not gonna live very long'

In the April 5 video which led to the arrest, Myers was seen rolling down her window and yelling, "Come on out, you slant eye!" at one point. “I called the cops on you, you little slant eye,” she tells Pham. Myers eventually returns to her own driveway before re-entering the road. Before driving away, she rolls down the window and yells, "You're not gonna live very long."

Shockingly, this wasn't the only incident, but just the latest incident between the two, according to Pham. "I don't feel safe in my home," Pham said, as she and her attorneys announced the civil lawsuit. "I was so scared and shake and I cry and get in the house." The young mother stated to reporters that since she moved into her house nearly four years ago, Myers has called her racial slurs, stalked her, and peered into her windows. The elderly woman began calling her "Miss Vietnam" and "Miss Saigon," and alleging that she was a mail-order bride, according to Healy and Pham.

'I don't feel safe in my home'

Meanwhile, Myers claimed she only had a problem with Pham and Healy's cat, which she claimed kept defecating on her lawn, and that the family was secretly photographing and filming her. But according to the Daily Beast, Myers was caught on video walking around naked from the waist down on her front porch, exposing herself to Pham's 2-year-old son. That, according to her husband, William Healy, was the final straw.

"When she completely exposed herself to my wife and 2-year-old son, I mean, to have to live next door to someone who's going to do something like that, and threaten her life, it's devastating," he said to the website. "I don't feel...safe in my house," added Pham. Myers was arrested and charged with a felony hate crime despite her adamant denials that she made racist remarks or threatened anyone.

Hard time proving 'intent'

According to the King County Sheriff's Office, she was ordered to stay away from Pham and her family and refrain from harassing them as part of the charge. However, the couple has filed a lawsuit alleging that she disobeyed the order, and their attorney, Jeffrey Campiche, told The Daily Beast that Myers has continued to "harass" and "stalk" the family since her arrest. In other words, the family claims that the cops' involvement was insufficient to stop a racist fear campaign.

Campiche questioned why Myers wasn't also arrested for indecent exposure."If a man had approached a two-year-old and his mother and pulled down his pants and exposed his genitalia what would happen with the police?" Officers didn't pursue the case because they would have had a difficult time proving Myers' "intent," according to a spokesman for the Shoreline Police Department. They chose to pursue the more serious charge of a hate crime instead.

'He went to Vietnam and bought her'

An attorney representing Myers in her criminal case, James Johanson, rebuffed any suggestion that she has a bias against Asians or minorities. He claimed that other neighbors, all of whom were white, had previously complained about her behavior. “They also were treated poorly, allegedly, by my client,” he said, and adding, perhaps to the ridiculousness of his stance, said: “She appears to not favor anybody. She probably has some issues with everybody, not just minorities.”

Myers told Pham to move out of the way because she didn't want her to get hurt while she was pulling into her driveway, according to the police report from the April incident, the Beast reported. "She doesn’t even speak English so she probably doesn’t know what I said,” Myers told police, according to the report. Healy, she claimed, had "just bought" Pham "like a month ago." “He just went over to Vietnam and bought her."

Police didn't buy it, and Myers was arrested and charged with a hate crime. Prior to her arrest on April 5, at least five neighbors approached deputies to tell them that “something needed to be done about Myers.” Despite this, Pham told FOX 13 in a tearful press conference on Tuesday that she feels trapped. "I feel like my life is [in] danger every day I go outside,” she said.