Darnell Colquitt thought the TV reporters didn’t belong in the Tillicum ’hood and told them so.

People tote heat around here, he warned. He started to pedal away on a bicycle, then stopped, turned, and told the reporters what would happen if they were still there when he came back.

“You’re dead where you stand,” he said.

That, and a hail of racial slurs, earned him a trip to jail Thursday, along with a rare charge from Pierce County prosecutors: a black-on-white hate crime.

Reporter Kevin McCarty and cameraman Terry Griffin of KIRO-TV were surprised to see things go that far.

Normally, they would have ignored Colquitt. But they worried about the woman they were visiting, the subject of that day’s story.

Someone had thrown homemade firebombs at her house. When the reporters left, would Colquitt come back and vent some misplaced rage?

“He’s gonna remember her,” McCarty said. “That was my concern.”

They called the sheriff’s deputies and showed them the tape of Colquitt’s threats. Griffin’s camera had been rolling the whole time.

The tape was good enough for a charge, said deputy prosecutor Phil Sorensen.

Prosecutors don’t file many hate-crime cases – one or two a month, Sorensen said. The formal charge is malicious harassment, and usually, the racial roles are reversed. Sorensen couldn’t think of another black-on-white example.

“I’m not aware that we’ve ever done it before,” he said. “But it wasn’t charged because it was a reverse deal. It was charged because he was telling these guys to get out of the neighborhood because of the color of their skin.”

Friday, Colquitt, 21, appeared in court for his arraignment. Bail was set at $20,000.

Sorensen said the amount was low because Colquitt didn’t have a history of violence.

Sean Robinson: 253-597-8486

sean.robinson@thenewstribune.com