Sometime after 11:00 p.m. on May 10, someone set fire to a car parked in the driveway of Steven and Jaelynn Sealey. Jaelynn Sealey said she was alerted by her dog barking and had gone downstairs to investigate. She had just gone out the back door when the car blew up. She ran back in the house and got her two children out while calling for help.

"It's lucky she wasn't injured in the explosion," said Steven Sealey, who was working at the time of the attack. "These people tried to kill me and my family, and destroy my property--there's no doubt."

After firemen put out the blaze, a neighbor noticed someone had painted "Go Home N------" on the door of the Sealeys' garage. Furniture on the back porch had been stacked in a corner and doused with gasoline.

The Sealey family had moved to the predominantly white, middle-class neighborhood about a year ago. Jaelynn Sealey described the outpouring of visits they got from supportive neighbors in the days following the assault, including some who power-washed the racist slur off their garage.

The Sunday evening rally, called by neighbors and announced the day before in the Charlotte paper, was mostly attended by residents of the neighborhood. A representative of the NAACP, the Sealeys, and local pastors spoke, as did the Huntersville mayor and the police chief.

Jeff Davis said he was a friend of the Sealeys who came because he "wanted to show support." Nothing like this had happened before in the area that he knew of. Kathleen Besson came with her children. "I thought it would be good for them to see most white people aren't that cruel," she said.

Derek Brown was one of a number of demonstrators who came from the University Park Baptist Church in Charlotte, which the Sealeys attend. "It's difficult to fathom that something like this is still happening," said Brown, who is Black. "Anyone who decides to live in a community shouldn't have to consider whether the color of their skin could be a problem."

A couple of residents speculated that the incident was precipitated by a recent debate in a community newsletter over the Confederate flag, though others disagreed. The editor of the newsletter had called for embracing the flag, which prompted a flurry of responses.

No one has yet been arrested in connection with the attack. Police say their investigation is continuing.  
 
 
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