A 72-year-old woman who is accused of hate crimes against her neighbor has agreed to sell her Seattle-area home as part of a civil agreement with the victim and her family.
As part of the agreement, Jan Myers, who is white, is expected to sell her home in Shoreline, Washington, within the next six months and pay the victim, Thi Pham, who is Vietnamese American $45,000 from that sale. If Myers does not move before the six months is up the case could be referred to a civil jury.
In April 2021 Pham said she was in her front yard when she noticed Myers in the road staring at her as she began to move her car back and forth. Fearful about what could happen next, Pham began recording Myers as she yelled several racial slurs and threats.
In the video, Myers is heard calling Pham “slant eye” and “Miss Vietnam” and threatening “you’re not going to live very long.” Pham told police that two weeks prior Myers had walked onto her patio naked from the waist down making obscene gestures in front of her two-year-old son.
Myers was charged with a hate crime in April 2021, but was released without bail shortly after. Pham and her husband, Bill Healy, filed a civil lawsuit in King County Superior Court in August 2021, claiming Myers had violated a no contact order and continued to harass them. The couple claim that Myers screamed at them and drove her car directly at Healy.
Attorneys for Pham and Healy announced the civil settlement Thursday.
“I am happy that I can safely live in my home without racial harassment,” Pham said. “We hope Jan Myers follows through the agreement and move quickly.”
“That was what made it very difficult, is when I realized my wife and my family, their physical well-being and their life was being threatened by this person,” Healy said.
“We need to make the people who are harassing people because of their race pay and make them pay the victim,” Pham and Healy’s attorney Jeffery Campiche added.
The next hearing in the criminal case is set for April 25. Myers’s trial is scheduled to begin on June 8.
