Talk:Killing of Vincent Chin/Archive 1

Pre 1982 Info
more pre-June 1982 background needed — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bcorr (talk • contribs) 2004-04-01 05:14:50

Vote for Deletion
This article survived a Vote for Deletion. The discussion can be found here. -Splash 01:24, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

Kind of Men
So the judge said "These weren't the kind of men you send to jail... " What "kind of men" do you send to jail? Apparently not white men who spend 30 minutes tracking down someone and beating them to death with a baseball bat, just because they are from another race? I can't think of a better candidate to send to prision, personally. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.186.36.172 (talk • contribs) 2006-11-22 17:48:43
 * Agreed. I remember having a discussion about the case with some white colleagues and I was aghast to hear "Well, they got the trial. What more do you want?" Um, justice? RahadyanS 13:24, 2 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Actually, I am having a very hard time attributing this quote through a primary source. Everybody says he said it, but where? Certainly not in any court transcript of the criminal case, his letter defending his decision, or his formal "Opinion and Decision". Perhaps he was goaded into the quote in the Bill Bonds interview? MMetro 09:39, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Kaufman as POW
What should be done about the POW issue? Twice put in, twice removed, but ACJ did list it as a reason that Kaufman's objectivity was compromised.MMetro 07:58, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Beginning of the Asian American movement
According to the source provided, Vincent Chin's death marked the "emergence of Asian Pacific Americans as a self-defined American racial group", so I guess we'll have to go with that. But really, the Asian American movement had its beginnings a few decades earlier when Asian Americans marched for civil rights during the civil rights era. Vincent Chin's death was definitely a turning point in the movement though, but it was more of a re-emergence rather than the beginning of the movement.

By the way, June 23rd (today or tomorrow depending on your timezone) marks the 25th anniversary of Vincent's death. There are events planned across some major cities in the US. Go check them out - http://www.apaforprogress.org/node/190

Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 04:03, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

may the likes of Ebens & Nitz be enlightened over their irrational & narrow-minded points of views due to the lack of better judgements & pre-understandings which will eventually cause the great catastrophic outcomes such as what we see the events of wars as the largest scale of conflicts in the modern world.mr_xmlv 16:39, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Little Facts
Robert Nitz was not working at an automotive company at the time of the murder he worked at a furniture store on Eight Mile Road.

Ronald Ebens owned a bar near the Lynch Road Chrysler (where he worked and was fired after the murder)Plant prior to the murder.


 * According to JButera and what I found in old phone directories, Ron's Place closed long before any of this happened. MMetro 14:05, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

What I want to know about Ronald Ebens and Michael Nitz: 1) Why are neither men listed on http://www.state.mi.us/mdoc/asp/otis2.html as they were both were convicted of murder? 2) Does this mean that someone cleaned their records? It does not seem right to me that neither men appear on the Michigan Offenders data base.Talk

Highland Appliance Picture
The theater next to the former Highland Appliance was the Paris theater. I'm not sure if it ever was a strip club, but it was definitely not the Fancy Pants club. If I want to cite court records as I make changes, how would I go about doing that? MMetro 06:45, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
 * I removed your "fancypants" reference, because it actually refers to Hiland Theatre being closed, not Fancy Pants being closed. What we really need is a reference to say that specifically Fancy Pants was closed as a result of the murder.  Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 15:48, 19 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Understood, although I was looking more at Brian74's comments, and it led me to two conclusions: one, the Fancy Pants is not the Hiland (that has led to much misinformation); and two, what was the Fancy Pants was closed down due to a fight, although it leaves the unlikely possibility that there was a seperate incident.
 * "The Fancy Pants was a bottomless bar located further south along Woodward Ave. on the E. side of the street. It was actually one block south of the Davidson expressway The Fancy pants was torn down many years ago after it was closed perminately following a beating incident which resulted in death." posted by brian74 on Jun 14, 2004 at 5:33am
 * "Why everyone thinks that he was killed at the Hiland Theatre is beyond me. Perhaps someone with mystic powers of mind control is working on the general populace making them beleive it was the Hiland Theatre. " posted by brian74 on Jun 21, 2004 at 5:22am
 * I do have sources that the arbiter of the original civil case had awarded the Chin estate $50,000 from the Fancy Pants for negligence that led to the death of Vincent Jen Chin, and am thinking about inquirying about demolition permit records from the City of Highland Park. MMetro 04:52, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Legal history section
Do we really need to make subsections for the Legal history section? It's not really long enough to warrant subsections. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 14:58, 30 August 2007 (UTC)


 * I created the subheadings because there are seperate trials, each of which has enough info to warrent its own subheading if somebody documents the research (perhaps with Dr. Frank Wu's upcoming book). The statements of mens rea and actus reus of the current 1 Sept 2007 page are oversimplifications, because that's true for any criminal act, but the state and federal cases had specific and important nuances.


 * For example, the original charge of 2nd degree murder could have been upgraded to 1st degree murder, but the prosecution was reluctant to prove a higher standard of premeditation to convict. This allowed the plea bargaining to third degree manslaughter and its ensuing probation. Just days after Kaufman's sentencing, a March 1983 Michigan Supreme Court decision on another case destroyed any chance that there could be justice done in the state courts. (People v. Dotson, I think, but I'm not a lawyer.)


 * The federal trial, to avoid double jeopardy, was entirely based on the racial motivations of the defendants, and where the instance of Ebens chasing Chin's Caucasian friends with the baseball bat shows premeditation to the state case, it could be argued that Ebens showed no discrimination on who he went after. The evidence that proves one case disproves the other! The federal case might have been open and shut ONLY if it was Jimmy Choi, the OTHER Chinese American in the group, who was killed. He did not partake in any physical altercation.


 * People want to know why there was no justice. This takes time and space to prove. Without, organizing the page to open up the need to do this work, how will it be done? The work is too much for a complete revision in one sitting. So, please, rather than undoing the work, hold discussions, ask for citations, or email my username (because I don't know how to reach you off of this page).

MMetro 18:32, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

I understand there were seperate trials, and I have not reverted your edit, I'm only asking if they're really big enough to warrant subsections. In my opinion they're not. Mind you, this is a purely editorial matter - I'm well aware of the importance of Vincent Chin. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 19:52, 1 September 2007 (UTC)


 * It will be                                         MMetro 03:18, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, it's not Dotson, but People v Whalen, 412 Mich 166, 169-170; 312 NW2d 638 (1981) (what Chan was trying to appeal with) and a Mich 3/29/1983 decision, this has been ignored by Zia, but key to understanding what happened under Kaufman. MMetro 00:59, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Ebensnitz.jpg
Image:Ebensnitz.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot 06:57, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

To anybody interested in keeping this picture - what we need to do is find a source. It says that the picture is a TV screen shot. But who took the screen shot? Was it downloaded from some website? Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 14:43, 27 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Whatever problems we have here, we have with the Ronald Ebens entry. I believe that pic is a screenshot taken from Who Killed Vincent Chin? Based on the editing style of the doc, I believe that picture to be from a 1984 in-depth report by CNN. That is all educated guessing. I have some interest in keeping it on the Ebens entry, but I never cared for it here. I'd rather have a map inset detailing where the events took place, pictures of the May 9, 1983 protest, or even the McDonald's (now a Coney Island). MMetro 15:18, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

I take it neither OneViewHere nor anyone else wa able to provide the keep data? MMetro 20:57, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
 * It was a while ago that I inserted that picture and I don't recall the justifications for fair use that I provided when I submitted the picture. I found the picture by doing a search on their names in Google.  I believe the picture is a screenshot from the "Who Shot Vincent Chin?" documentary. OneViewHere 07:32, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
 * That might be a trouble seeing as the DVD is $300. Of course, the filmmakers got that shot from a news source. I remember that your fair use rationale said something about how the two men were of interest to officials, but had "disappeared", meaning no new pictures could be obtained. MMetro 07:58, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Right, pictures of the two men definitely qualifies for fair use. We just need to provide a source for their pictures.  If they were downloaded from some website, then that website needs to be attributed.  If an editor made a screen capture himself/herself, then the image summary needs to say that, and say from what video/source the screen capture is.  Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 14:42, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

If OneViewHere Googled the screenshot, would any other Google search work, or do we have to know where OneViewHere visited? MMetro 20:18, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
 * It should preferably be a specific website, and not the URL for a Google search. And as always, the more reliable/well-known a source, the better - an established news site is definitely better than, for example, some random website hosted on geocities, if you know what I mean.  Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 20:39, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

New Source
There was a Vincent Chin legal luncheon downtown Detroit last Tuesday. I now have a peer reviewed article focusing on the federal case and a real picture of the Fancy Pants. The Freep gave a copy of pic to a 501c non profit. I also had a brief chat with the Federal Judge who was Ebens' attorney at the time. He said the "because of you MFs" testimony was impeached at trial. Any help, especially in getting the pic past the hurdles, is greatly appreciated. MMetro (talk) 09:51, 18 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The Free Press apparently owns the picture I referred to above, AFAIK. If anybody can get a hold of a non-journalism produced image of the trial or Fancy Pants, let us know. The FBI and prosecution had acquired many images of the Fancy Pants and crime scene, all of which are fair use as a work of the U.S. government. MMetro (talk) 00:21, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

External links modified
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GA?
Is it time to try for GA status? The article is really very well referenced, and it has grown to a good size now. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 20:11, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
 * That would make me proud, contributing to a GA, but is it a one shot, or a revision process? Giving the article a lookover before applying would be a good idea. Can you archive the talk before this GA discussion? It looks like we'll need room to work.
 * The Zia book is a decent bio source and is invaluably detailed on the formation of ACJ, but frankly, she failed to do any updated research on the civil case past, let's say, 1987, due to the lack of information on the Ebens v. Chrysler suit. The fact is that other editors have been able to locate Ebens, and Rolawd Hwang, current ACJ president, told me that they know where he is (although I won't include that because of WP:NOR). Ebens' disappearance in the book is attributable to poor fact checking.
 * I have a concern that the $20 Jimmy Perry story, though often told, may violate WP:BIO. I don't know if he is still alive, but jury selection transcripts mention him as a family man, and I think his testimony was that he was just trying to get them to the hospital. I had wondered about the veracity of that story myself, until I learned of the hospital he was referring to, which was definitely closer, although not one of the more well known in the area.
 * The presentence report given to Kaufman lists two days served in jail, corresponding to the weekend that Ebens was held in custody after the initial assault. The commonly disseminated belief is that he never went to jail, even though he mentions the experience in the documentary.
 * Any of the famous quotes from the case need to be properly sourced and investigated for NPOV. It seems many inaccuracies in the reporting can be attributed to the original press releases of ACJ, which was definitely promoting an agenda.
 * I would suggest that refs to the documentary cite the elapsed time, or else people can change things and say it was somewhere in the documentary. I consider the research put into the article to be high enough that at this point, we need to know where and when.
 * Would the article benefit from sourcing the specific addresses of the incidents, thereby eliminating future debacles like the Fancy Pants.jpg? Could anything be done with Google StreetView?
 * I'm concerned that a trivia label may be applied on our list.
 * Frank Wu is writing a new book focussing on the case. It will be a significant secondary source, but it won't be ready for at least a year.
 * We should be proud that Wikipedia is currently the most up to date source on the Vincent Chin case, but I think that the discussions between me and Subdulous highlight the struggle of remaining NPOV. We must not forget the outrage the case created, but we must also struggle with the distortions that were presented as fact. I'm sure that is not the first time that this has occurred for something mentioned in Wikipedia, nor will it be the last.
 * MMetro (talk) 09:02, 19 September 2008 (UTC)


 * As far as I know, you can nominate an article for GA promotion as many times as you want. Though obviously common sense dictates that real article improvements were performed between each nomination.  And yeah definitely, we need to do some copy-editing before we actually nominate it.  (I was hoping to get to do that this weekend, but I have ran into some computer problems and need to spend time on that first.)
 * About Zia's book - if there are other reliable sources that offer better information, then we should definitely use them. But the important thing here is that they qualify as reliable sources under Reliable sources.  So you are absolutely right about being careful of WP:NOR.  However, unless I'm missing something, the article does not seem to mention that Ebens disappeared after the 1987 settlement.  Shouldn't that be mentioned?
 * I think as long as the Jimmy Perry story is referenced by reliable sources, we won't run afoul of WP:BIO. Having said that, here are a few refs for it - .  I would say the first is probably the most reliable.  Though accounts seem to differ in the quote - "get those chinks" vs. "get those Chinese guys".  Um...  I tend to think it was the former, because I can't really picture disgruntled Detroit auto workers in the 80s who are about to beat an Asian guy with a baseball bat saying "Chinese guys" as opposed to "chinks".  But maybe this is moot because I'm not sure about the value of including that in the article.
 * About whether or not there was jail time - if different reliable sources are saying different things about this, we may consider including both accounts, and attributing the claims in-content. As in...  "According to XXX, Ebens never spent a day in jail, but Kaufman...  " so on and so forth.  Though I suspect the "served no jail time" claim essentially refers to the fact that they were not sent to prison by a court judgement.  The better word for them to have used was "prison" as opposed to "jail", I think.  But we are stuck with what we have, which says "jail".
 * Information at the granularity of addresses and phone numbers should not be mentioned in articles unless that information is specifically notable in and of itself - for example the White House address or 10 Downing Street. As for editors coming here and making mistakes about Fancy Pants, I think that's just something we have to live with and watch over, per the "open" nature of WP.
 * Going back to the GA nomination - usually the way it works is that a GA reviewer will review the article and lists a number of things to improve upon before he thinks it is GA quality. At which point editors work on the reviewer's concerns, and notify him when they are addressed.  I think reviewers generally give at least a couple of weeks to work through their concerns.  Usually what gets a GA nomination rejected is that the reviewer lists his concerns, but nobody works on addressing them.  Though on some occasions GA nominations do get rejected immediately because of the poor quality of particular articles.  But even if that happens, we can improve the article and re-nominate it again.  So don't worry too much issues that might get the GA nomination rejected.  Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 15:31, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * There should be no mention of any disappearance. The courts were able to find him, and contributors have even posted Ebens' Nevada address in the past-- it's not reputable reporting.
 * In regards to sentencing, we just need to be careful and accurate about what we say, as compared to how other secondary sources understood it. He spent the weekend in jail (ref Who killed Vincent Chin-- time cite needed). He was credited with two days served (ref Presentence report, American Citizens for Justice, Box 4 Bentley Library, University of Michigan). Kaufman sentenced him to three years probation and a fine.
 * The Jimmy Perry stuff should mention both sides of his story and not get into inflammatory language (especially about what kind of person would help those guys) to meet NPOV.
 * We're really going to have to take variances about what was believed to have been said into account. Personally, I think if he said something at that point, he probably said Chinese guys. Detroit is not a town where you can carelessly say the N word, and that carries over into other slurs. The case lecture featuring David Lawson also mentioned how dubious it was that anything ethnically offensive was said. The prosecution was given the burden of proving racial intent given an absence of anything said that was explicitly racial. In any case, our own opinions about what we think was said do not matter at all.
 * Source #1 is great. I was given a copy of the newsletter at that luncheon where I met David Lawson. The photo of the Fancy Pants (and probably the other photos) was courtesy of the Detroit Free Press. I asked the author if we could get fair use for Wikipedia and that is what I was told by email. I'll have to double check, but I think the photo of Chin was his senior high school yearbook photo.
 * Source #2 appears to be a reprint of Zia's 1984 article for The Nation. Zia heavily borrowed on her previous work to write her chapter in Asian American Dreams. The article was good, but we must remember that it doesn't cover anything after the time it was written and that is a limiting factor to the veracity of her 2000 book.
 * Source #3 is a copy of the original appellate decision. The text meets fair use as a work of the US government. You could even copy it to Wiki. It is a great source for info on the Liza Chan tapes.
 * Also look up Paul Weingarten, "Deadly Encounter", Chicago Tribune, July 31, 1983 page F10 and Michael Moore, "The Wages of Death: The Man Who Killed Vincent Chin" Detroit Free Press Sunday Magazine August 30, 1987, p. 12.
 * In terms of general location, the Fancy Pants was the SE corner of Woodward and Davison. The McDonald's was Woodward, just north of Glendale. I can cite the specific address from the court documents, if needed. Woodward is itself noteworthy, and mentioning the locations gives scale to the chase. You can see the original McDonald's in Google StreetView. The specific numerical address probably isn't needed.
 * Generally, I think we should use Asian American criticisms only as a citation for reaction and legacy, stick to the best facts and cites that we have of the historical situation, and be very wary of generalities about what happened after the case because the documentary is outdated, and whatever we do put up should comply with Wikipedia's verifiability standards. Reliability of the source is the most important factor.
 * Thanks for creating an archive and bringing up some great sources to work with. Let's continue the work, even after achieving GA, to see if we can reach Featured Article. MMetro (talk) 01:45, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Pinyin
This article oddly uses different pinyin for the same characters:

Vincent Jen Chin 陳 Bing Hing Chin 陳 Liza Cheuk May Chan 陳

You not9ice the same character is translated as both chin and chan...I'm pretty sure one of these has to be correct, but surely they can't both be correct.

wiki notes the character is CHEN or chan but not chin http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%99%B3 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 123.204.66.119 (talk) 06:42, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I do not know about Liza Chan's pinyin, but the Chin family's pinyin is correct, and is on the parents' tombstone. I hope to make a picture available in the Spring. MMetro (talk) 19:44, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
 * No, actually the pinyin is wrong. However, he is still most commonly known as "Vincent Chin" in English, so the common name rule for WP applies here.  The case is similar for people like Gary Locke (politician).  Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 19:52, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
 * When you say the pinyin is wrong, which do you refer to? It is quite possible that the Chin family transliterated their name into English differently, some 60+ years ago, and without having any standards to go by. I've seen it happen from Thai with my own last name, which is actually the character Ma as in horse. Other evidence is the C.W. Hing as the father's name on the tombstone. Before 1967, the city directory listed that as Vincent's father's name-- Chin Wing Hing. After that, it was corrected. My best W:NOR guess is that's when a school-age Vincent realized that there was a problem with the family name was getting mixed up with his dad's first name, since family names come first in Chinese. In any case, Hong is right; it doesn't affect the English, but I wouldn't change the translations, because there is no way to verify that you would be correct in translation. As I have noted, Chin and 陳 is what's on the tombstone. MMetro (talk) 22:44, 9 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I should have been more exact. By "pinyin", I was referring to Pinyin specifically.  But anyway, I'm guessing "Chin" was used most probably because that was a more exact romanisation of how 陳 was pronounced in his family's dialect, which should have been one of the Cantonese sub-dialects.  Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 02:33, 10 January 2009 (UTC)
 * "Chin" (and sometimes "Chinn") is most likely the Toisanese phoneticization of 陳. In Cantonese would be "Chan". Tinhor (talk) 11:28, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
 * This is correct. "Chin" is described as reflecting the Taishanese/Toisanese/Hoisanese pronunciation in the article for the surname, and the family spoke this variety of Chinese, as can be heard in video footage of Lily Chin. Also, David Chin's service in the American military during World War II indicates his presence in the United States (and thus the Romanization of his name) prior to the development of Hanyu Pinyin in the 1950's. Taishanese was the most common type of Chinese spoken in the United States at the time. Scion of Civilization (talk) 19:47, 9 April 2021 (UTC)

Murder of Robert Eric Wone
Those interested in mysterious, controversial murders will also be interested in this article Bachcell (talk) 18:06, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Documentaries and references in popular culture section
The "popular culture" section is quite a mess. I separated the documentaries but there are still some entries that just don't fit in there. not sure what subsection title could be used for entries like "In 1983, Lily Chin appeared on The Phil Donahue Show to bring public attention to the case." and most others. Any suggestions?The Magnificent Clean-keeper (talk) 04:56, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Memorial plaque in Ferndale, MI
http://www.wxyz.com/dpp/news/region/oakland_county/plaque-honoring-murdered-man-unveiled-in-ferndale and http://www.multiculturaltoolbox.com/American_Citizens_for_Justice/legalmilestone.html MMetro (talk) 06:03, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Court reenactment based on Federal court transcripts
http://prawfsblawg.blogs.com/prawfsblawg/2013/05/dean-wu-and-judge-chin-reenact-vincent-chin-trial.html MMetro (talk) 20:28, 3 August 2013 (UTC)