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Sikh Man's Hair Cut A Hoax


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http://www.bergenrecord.com/page.ppa?qstr=...3ZxZWVFRXl5Mw==

Robbery/hate crime called a hoax

Friday, July 11, 2003

By AMY KLEIN

STAFF WRITER

It sounded like a horrible hate crime.

Police officers recounted the details in somber voices: During a brash drugstore robbery, a Sikh employee's arm was slashed, his turban removed, and his hair chopped off. Slurs were used, police said.

Within a day, the story of the North Arlington holdup was posted on Sikh message boards, and outraged community leaders were notifying Washington legislators while offering counseling to the 21-year-old victim.

Then the story unraveled.

Police now say the June 30 robbery was a hoax, a carefully staged ruse to steal $5,600 from the cash register. And the advocates who rushed to the store manager's defense say they feel duped.

Harminder Singh originally told police that two black men armed with a knife and a gun had burst into the Schuyler Avenue CVS store, led him to the rear, and cut off his hair before fleeing with the cash. Sikhs are forbidden by their religion to cut their hair, believing it is a gift from God.

Singh's descriptions of the robbers were vivid: The gunman was 5-foot-5 with cornrows, a dark sleeveless shirt, and loose khaki pants. The second robber wore a black mask and a T-shirt with the words "I love you" emblazoned in red across the front. A blond-haired white man stood watch outside.

But Singh himself had

actually cut the power to the store, snipped his own hair, and slashed his own hand, North Arlington police Capt. Louis Ghione said Thursday. The $5,600 was found under the back seat of his car, Ghione said.

Singh was charged with theft and filing a false police report. He was released on his own recognizance pending a court hearing. A date had not been set.

Singh's mother, who answered the phone at the family's Teaneck home, would not comment. His lawyer said Singh comes from a very strict and religious family.

"I'm sure that the entire story will come out in due time," said lawyer Eddie Raynord Hadden.

Police turned suspicious when the store surveillance tape contradicted Singh's account, Ghione said.

For instance, he said, Singh told police he had wheeled in stray carts from the parking lot as he locked up the store, but that is not seen on the videotape. He also told police that the robbers approached him as he was locking the door, but no one else appears on the videotape, Ghione said.

Detectives confronted Singh, and he offered to take a polygraph test. He confessed just before it was administered, said Capt. Gary Fanning.

"The way he cut his hair was not even consistent with his story," Fanning said. "He said it was cut with a knife, but it was cut like in a salon."

News of the hoax rocked national groups that had flocked to Singh's aid. Rajwant Singh, national chairman of the Washington-based Sikh Council on Religion and Education, said he was humiliated and angered.

"People are just outraged. We feel that this is the lowest anybody can go to exploit a situation for their own personal benefit," Rajwant Singh said.

The council was one of several national organizations to contact police last week, wanting to offer condolences to the family and counseling for the victim. Word of the reported hate crime was posted on about a dozen Sikh e-groups, alerting about 10,000 people

to the incident, Rajwant Singh said.

He even put in a call to a senator who is drafting hate-crime legislation, to fill him in on the details of the incident. Since 9/11, he said, Sikhs have been working to educate Americans about the community, whose estimated 25 million worldwide members follow a religion established more than five centuries ago in northern India.

sikhsangat thread http://forums.waheguroo.com/index.ppa?act=ST&f=2&t=468

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I knew that reporters gonna find this soon.. Some singhs knew it before and they tried their best to keep this new twist as a low profile..

That stupid guy did sooo much damage to sikh community nationwide.. I would request singhs/kaurs not to spread this news anywhere.. cauz it will damage our image more...

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Guest SikhForLife

well teaneck, NJ is like 20 min away from me... and all the sikh from teaneck come to our GW.. and ive never seen this guy.. and my friend that lives in teaneck says hes never heard of this guy...

i guess he wasnt really into sikhi ..

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Guest mehtab

ajeeb banda hai :D

hor koi tarika nahi labbeya mashoor hon da :D

sago badnaam ho gayaa :D @

naale bakiyaan nu we sharminda kita :D @

There is no shortage of losers anywhere. My mother is the principal of a school in United Arab Emirates (ohi apna UAE :D ). There was a Punjabi dude who had last name Singh. He and his entire family converted to islam, coz the government there pays a huge amount of money to any non-muslim who embraces islam (i still couldn't figure out why they say embrace ohmy.gif ). This guy and his family (wife n kids) converted. His kids were students in the same school where my mother was principal. He comes and tells my mother that his kids' fees had been exempted (i dunno if they were exempted from paying school fees of if their sc

hool fees was reduced) as they had converted. My mother refused to sign on any document authorizing any such preference for his kids, and asked him to get written and signed permission from the ministry of education. He did that and got what he wanted, coz its a muslim country and if u are a muslim u are preferrd over everyone else, but i m more than glad that my mother never signed anywhere.

What boiled me was that how could this loser forget all those shaheeds who gave up their life but not Sikhi. And he and his whole stupid family gave it all up just for some amount of money and small priviledges. Its not that they were under any pressure. No one forces u to be a muslim even in a muslim country. And even if one is financially not very well off, leaving one's religion (that too a religion like Sikhi) for money is the best example of lunacy.

This dude of NJ also wanted to get fame. Too bad he even lost his name.

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Okay this stuff happened.. as of the punjabi predictions.. we all will notice :

1) Community will throw insults on his parents forever.. (Who have no role in this incident)

2) This guy did a crime and he will pay it by full extent of justice .. by serving jail time (possible).. BUT our community will hate this guy forever, no matter what..

When we have this type of situation.. we should take things really cool.. Just be in that guy's shoes... Maybe he was in depression (21yrs old is the depressin stage).. All im saying is that he gonna repay his crime of what he did.. But my question is that "Is Guy like this gonna remain as criminal/not sikh in our community"? I bet his parents won't have a guts to go to their their local gurdwara for moral support or just to pray, cauz they know that ppls will be give them all kind of looks and stuff.. which is sad and it always happen.. :D

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