Netflix star Midori Francis reveals she was spat on in racist attack amid surge in Anti-Asian hate crimes

Hate crimes against Asian-Americans in 16 US cities rose by 150 per cent in 2020, a study has revealed

Netflix star Midori Francis has revealed that she was spat on in a racist attack, as the number of Anti-Asian hate crimes continues to rise in the US.

The actor – who led the 2020 romantic comedy series Dash & Lily – opened up about her experience in a since deleted Twitter post. 

On her personal Twitter account, the actor detailed the incident in which she was “spat on directly by a passenger in a black car which slowed down and intentionally spat out the window at me”.

The Good Boys actor – who is of Japanese descent – said the attack occurred at 2:37pm in Los Angeles, and that she was unable to identify the number plate of the car. 

Francis asked her followers for help in contacting a specific hate crime hotline, and later added that she had since issued a report with stopaapihate.org and standagainsthatred.org.

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The 26-year-old commented that she was “sad to see there was a whole category for being spat on” when reporting the crime.

Teen Wolf star Arden Cho recently shared an Instagram post detailing a racist attack on her that happened while she was walking her dog. Cho wrote that a man had screamed that he was going to “motherf***ing kill” her and her “f***ing dog”.

Francis and Cho’s experiences come amid a continued surge in Anti-Asian hate crimes in the US. Three shootings at Atlanta spas last month saw eight people killed, six of whom were Asian women.

A study by the Centre for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino, found that hate crimes against Asian-Americans in 16 cities rose by 150 per cent in 2020.

In the UK, police data suggests there has been a 300 per cent increase in hate crimes towards people of Chinese, East and Southeast Asian heritage in the first quarter of 2020 compared to the same period in 2018 and 2019.