Man sentenced to time served for hate crime attack in Orange County

FULLERTON, Calif. – A 33-year-old man pleaded guilty Thursday and was immediately sentenced to time served in jail for a hate crime and two other attacks in the main Anaheim library and a Target store.

Ivory Julian Anderson Jr. attacked a clerk at the Anaheim Central Library, 500 W. Broadway, about 6:15 p.m. March 3, 2022, according to Anaheim police. Anderson walked up to the clerk and hit him, knocking down the victim, who hit his head and lost consciousness, police said.

The victim told police he bumped into Anderson and said “excuse me” before Anderson “used his body to bump him,” Deputy District Attorney William Ha said in court papers.

Police released surveillance video of the attack to help track down the suspect, which led to a call about a similar attack at a Target store at 101 S. Euclid St. about two hours earlier that same day, police said.

Anderson shoved a customer at the store near a cash register and a short time later chased the victim around the store, police said.

In an attack on March 12, 2022, in Anaheim’s Betsy Ross Park, Anderson punched a man three times in the back of the head and kicked him twice, Ha said. As the victim walked away, Anderson said, “You (expletive) Mexican, you guys think you can do whatever you want,” Ha said.

Anderson pleaded guilty to battery with serious bodily injury, violation of civil rights with a violent injury, both felonies, and misdemeanor counts of battery and identity theft.

Anderson accepted a plea deal from Orange County Superior Court Judge Fernando Valle, who sentenced the defendant to 312 days, or time he has already accrued since his arrested, according to court records. He was placed on two years of formal probation and ordered to stay 100 yards away from the library.

Anderson has a prior conviction for battery on May 9, 2021, in a Ralphs grocery store in Pasadena where he threw scalding water on the back of an employee’s right shoulder, Ha said.

“The victim believed she was targeted because she was of Asian descent,” Ha said. The two had never met before, he added.

A witness told police after Anderson attacked the employee with the hot water he mocked her saying “so sorry’ in a derogatory Asian accent,” Ha said.