Krishna Temple near Spanish Fork a target of recent hate crimes, leadership says
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- A bullet hole in a window of the Sri Sri Radha Krishna Temple near Spanish Fork is shown.
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- A bullet hole in the structure of the Sri Sri Radha Krishna Temple near Spanish Fork is shown.
Leaders of the Sri Sri Radha Krishna Temple near Spanish Fork said the temple has been a recent target of hate crimes and domestic terrorism.
A minimum of 20-30 bullets were fired at the temple building or property within the last few days, according to leadership. They said the attacks likely came at night and did not physically harm anyone but occurred while people were inside the building and may have caused thousands of dollars of structural damage.
“The Hindu community is closing ranks and saying, ‘This is terrible. What can we do?’ Because it is really some sort of religious persecution,” said Vai Warden, co-founder of Utah’s Krishna Temple and wife of temple priest Caru Das.
Sgt. Raymond Ormond of the Utah County Sheriff’s Office said the agency has received calls regarding the alleged incident and is looking into them.
On June 18, Warren said there was a “huge bang” and smoke coming from the roof of the 15-acre campus’ radio station, but temple officials could not determine what it was, hypothesizing it may be fireworks, and did not report on the incident.
But over a week later, on Friday, Warren said they found a bullet had been shot through one of the temple’s windows and traveled into an opposite wall of the temple’s worship room. She said they also found several bullet holes in the temple’s structure, some damaging the building’s arches.
“Those arches are about $10,000 each,” Warren said. “They’re beautifully hand carved, very nicely presented arches. And so fortunately, when the bullets have gone into any of the structure, they’ve just made a hole, and either pinged off or gone inside. But if they were hitting some particular part of them, they could do some serious damage. We haven’t yet had time to go up and see if they’ve hit any of the domes.”
Warren also said they found approximately 20 bullet casings on the road outside the security fence. Security cameras were able to identify there was a pickup truck parked in front of the temple at some point during the night of the incident but could not determine anything further, she added.
The Utah County Sheriff’s Office was alerted of the threat and has visited the property multiple times, according to temple officials, and a security guard has been placed on nightly guard, while further security lighting, fencing and cameras have been installed.
The Krishna Temple is offering a $1,000 reward to anyone who contributes to the arrest and conviction of the perpetrators and is asking people who hear gunshots near the property to call 911.
Warren said the Krishna Temple has done well in south Utah County and that they have a strong relationship with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but she believes the attack may be less religious motivated and more politically motivated.
“I personally feel there’s an atmosphere going on in these days which is somewhat impeaching of people who are not following the status quo of leadership,” she said. “We have our own lifestyles which are free from violence or envy or competition, and we try to live simply amongst ourselves and follow our culture.”
