Chad Martin Jurjaks, a Costa Mesa white dude, pleaded guilty Thursday to yelling “Fucking Mexicans” as, without provocation, he punched a 42-year-old man and his 26-year-old nephew outside a 7-Eleven in his racially charged hometown last March. The counts the 31-year-old copped to were two felony
counts of hate crime battery causing injury. With a sentencing enhancement that was originally filed alleging a prior strike conviction for
criminal threats in 2006, Jurjaks was looking at up to seven years and four months in a state prison cell.
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With the guilty plea, don't be surprised to see a lighter sentence when Jurjaks faces the judge Feb. 17 in Santa Ana.
The two victims, the older man's wife and his cousin–Hispanic all–were walking
into the convenience store in Costa Mesa around 10:30 p.m.
March 15, 2011, when they were approached by an obviously drunk Jurjaks yelling, “Fucking Mexicans!” Before they could respond, Jurjaks beat the head of the 42-year-old three times, then did the same once to his nephew while still yammering, “Fucking Mexicans!”
Boozy eventually walked away, and the family called 9-1-1. Costa Mesa Police officers arrested Jurjaks near the store.
Previous coverage of the Jurjaks case:
This 2006 story predicted hate crimes rising in Costa Mesa:
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.
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