Community demands action after swastika and racial slur found in Ventura County Park

A City of Camarillo park sign facing a residential street was defaced with a red, backwards swastika spray-painted across the city seal — echoing a string of recent hate crimes in Ventura County, where swastikas have also appeared. Vandals also added two crude drawings of male genitalia spray-painted in red.

The vandalism, which took place at Community Center Park, extended to a nearby utility box, which was also defaced with red spray paint depicting three more drawings of male genitalia and the N-word, a racial slur targeting Black people. The park, managed by the Pleasant Valley Recreation & Park District, has been a public space since the district's formation in January 1962 under California's Public Resource Code.

"I know what America is about and I know about America's original sin, which is racism," Ronald Wilson, a 62-year-old combat veteran who lives less than a block from the vandalism site, told CALÓ News as he described his initial reaction to the defacement.

Wilson also expressed concern, not only for himself, as a Black man who has lived through decades of racial hostility in America, but also for the people closest to him. His wife is Latina, and together they are raising children who are both Black and Latino.

Earlier this year, in preparation for new threats to California's immigrant communities, Attorney General Rob Bonta issued an information bulletin to all district attorneys, police chiefs, sheriffs and state law enforcement agencies. The directive was intended to ensure that officials statewide have the guidance and tools necessary to respond swiftly and appropriately to hate crime activity.

While California is recognized for having some of the nation's most comprehensive hate crime laws, enforcement remains inconsistent. Responses can differ sharply between cities, and hate crimes are often underreported in the state's rural areas.

"As of now, the deputies who took the report took it as a hate crime and vandalism," Sgt. Skaggs of the Ventura County Sheriff's Department told CALÓ News, adding that dispatchers received the call at 6:51 a.m."

Officers from the City of Camarillo and Ventura County sheriff's deputies arrived at approximately 7:51 a.m., according to Julie Hanson, a Camarillo resident who was at the scene before law enforcement.

Sgt. Skaggs confirmed that two sheriff's deputies responded. It remains unclear how many Camarillo officers were present, though at least one city patrol vehicle was seen at the site.

"I learned about the incident through a Facebook group called Democratic Moms of Camarillo, also known as D-Mock," Hanson told CALÓ News, adding that she parked her car in front of the vandalism to block it from view until law enforcement arrived. However, several community members passing by still saw it.

The vandalism unfolded against a backdrop of growing fear among immigrant communities, fears sharpened when Congress approved more than $100 billion in new funding for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on July 4, 2025.

The package extends through 2029 and calls for the hiring of 10,000 additional ICE agents to accelerate the administration's mass deportation agenda. This expansion, many immigrant advocates say, has emboldened acts of racism and intimidation.

"We are alarmed by the rise in racially motivated incidents across Ventura County," said Primitiva Hernandez, Executive Director of 805UndocuFund, an organization that leads the 805 Immigrant Coalition.

She noted that farmworkers have recently been targeted in other hateful incidents, including feces smeared on portable toilets at agricultural sites. "These are not isolated events but part of a troubling pattern of racism and intimidation," Hernandez said.

Hernandez also cited the brutal attack on Michael Robinson in Simi Valley as another sign of the escalating danger posed by unchecked hate, saying, "These are not isolated events but part of a troubling pattern of racism and intimidation."

The Los Angeles office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-LA) also condemned the assault on Michael Robinson, a Black teenager who was brutally beaten on August 1 outside a Simi Valley movie theater by a group of youths heard on video using racial slurs.

Camarillo City Councilmember Dr. Martita Martinez-Bravo said she was deeply troubled to learn of the swastika and racial slurs in her city. She pledged to push for a formal anti-hate resolution. "Hate has no place in our city," she emphasized, adding that the City of Camarillo councilmembers received an email containing hate speech just last month. That incident is still being investigated.

Another Ventura County resident, who asked to remain anonymous, told CALÓ News she was disheartened to see hate crimes remain a recurring thread in American life. She shared that she, too, had been the target of a hate crime this past June, when her own property was defaced with markings similar to those recently discovered at Community Center Park.

"I felt numb for the first week or so after it happened," the Ventura County resident said. It was her first direct encounter with such hate, yet the experience felt hauntingly familiar. She had seen photographs of her relatives in the South, where burning crosses appeared in their front yards—symbols of hate meant to terrorize entire communities.

At Community Center Park, the graffiti was removed by 9:30 a.m., but its traces remained. Faint red streaks from the spray paint were still visible across the public notice sign. On the utility box, the N-word and obscene images had not been removed, but only covered over with a coat of white paint.

"I rely on my faith a lot," the Ventura County resident said. Through different mediums in art, she explained, she practices Visio Divina, a contemplative form of prayer that invites the practitioner to encounter the divine through images — a method, she explained, that helps her heal from the hateful images that have grown all too familiar in her community.

If you wish to report a hate crime and remain anonymous, please contact Ventura County Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS (8477).