Foreign Cars Targeted by Vandals

UPDATE This sort of mentality has prevailed in the UAW throughout the automotive industry ever since foreign competition threatened the UAW's overpaid jobs and cushy benefits. In Michigan, foreign car owners have been taunted and their cars vandalized ever since the Japanese automakers began to surpass the Big Three in quality and value. In June of 1982, there was a horrific murder in Highland Park when a Chinese-American, Vincent Chin, was mistaken for being Japanese by two Chrysler UAW members.

The Chrysler employees, plant superintendent Ronald Ebens, and his stepson, Michael Nitz, taunted Chin in a bar where he was celebrating his upcoming wedding at a bachelor party. Ebens instigated the incident by declaring, "It's because of you little motherfuckers that we're out of work," referring to U.S. auto manufacturing jobs being lost to Japan, despite the fact that Chin was not Japanese. Ebens and Nitz followed Chin when he left the premises and bludgeoned him to death with a baseball bat.

Many of the layoffs in Detroit's auto industry, including Nitz in 1979, had been due to the increasing market share of Japanese automakers, leading to allegations that Chinese-American Vincent Chin received racially charged comments before his death.

12/14/08 It seems the economic conditions and the auto industry crisis is turning some Americans against Americans. Woodhaven, Michigan (near Detroit) police said four cars on Friday, all produced by foreign carmakers, had two tires slashed and "Buy USA" written on them. Police said three of the cars were parked in a strip mall in Woodhaven that sits next to a Ford stamping plant. Kim Lebecki's 2009 Toyota Camry was one of the four targeted by the vandal.

"I work very hard to make the payment to drive the car of my choice in the United States and someone else has the audacity to destroy these vehicles," Lebecki said. "It saddens me to think, 'Is this a UAW member who did this?'"

One of incidents was caught on a security tape. A red Ford Escape is seen pulling into a parking space, a middle-aged man can be seen approaching a red foreign car and slashing both tires. The man can also be seen writing a message on the car before leaving.

"We don't have any positive evidence to link a Ford employee with this incident," said Lt. Robert Harabedian, of the Woodhaven Police Department.