Activist Vauhxx Booker says he was almost lynched by a group of white man who threatened to ‘get a noose’

Vauhxx Booker claims a group of white men assaulted and threatened to “get a noose” after he and his friends trespassed on private property on July 4th weekend at Indiana lake to watch the lunar eclipse. The incident sparked dozens of people to protest in front of the Bloomington, Indiana courthouse earlier this week. According to CBS Indianapolis affiliate WTTV, a red car hit two demonstrators at one of the protests where people were demanding for justice in the lake incident.

Booker, a local activist and member of the Monroe County Human Rights Commission, posted video of the incident on Facebook he says shows apart of the incident at the lake. Booker called 911 after the men assaulted him and forced him to a tree at Lake Monroe.

Booker said he apologized for trespassing, however,  that five white men then attacked him. CBS News reported:

Booker wrote that the men threatened to break his arms and said, “get a noose,” while telling his friends to leave the area. He also said one of the men had a hat with a Confederate flag on it and that the men made statements about “white power.”

One video clip that he posted shows a white man holding Booker up against a tree.  Another depicts a different man calling someone off-camera a “nappy headed (expletive).” In another, the same man yells, “You invaded us!” and calls someone in Booker’s group a “stupid (expletive) liberal (expletive).”

“We were calm and polite, but looking back now, it’s apparent that these individuals began targeting our group the moment they saw myself, a Black man and were looking to provoke a conflict,” Booker wrote.

Booker says has suffered minor concussion, bruises and cuts. Along with patches of his hair pulled out. Bloomington Mayor John Hamilton and Bloomington City Clerk Nicole Bolden both released  a statement expressing  “outrage and grief” over what they said was a racially motivated assault.