After their brother was killed by a white supremacist, the Ileto family became activists

The Ileto family spoke to media after Burford Furrow was sentenced to 115 years in jail.

The recent shootings by white supremacists in Dayton, El Paso and Gilroy brought back the pain of another shooting 20 years ago when a white supremacist drove down from Washington looking to kill Jews.

Burford Furrow went on a hate-filled shooting rampage at the North Valley Jewish Community Center in Granada Hills, a Los Angeles suburb. He began shooting indiscriminately and wounded five people in the lobby.

When the gunman, Buford Furrow, came across postal carrier Joseph Ileto, he killed the Filipino American simply because of the color of his skin.

When prosecutors charged Furrow, they said he stated that "the postal worker was a good target of opportunity to kill because he was non-white and worked for the federal government."

Although Ileto's death occurred two decades ago, his family still feels the pain and hurt of his death as if it was yesterday.

Ileto's brother Ismael recalled that fateful day. As the news unfolded, he told KABC, officials talked about the children and others at the Jewish Community Center who were shot, and then "there's a little note of a postal worker being shot."

JOSEPH ILETO

"When it was first reported, he was just mentioned as a postal worker," Deena said. "No name, no identity, no race."

The family wondered, "Why don't they see us?"

"It seemed like we didn't count," Ismael said. "Because they didn't describe him or his heritage and that's mainly the reason why he was killed."

The family could have remained silent to mourn Ileto's death in private.

"They could have suffered in silence, but they didn't. They spoke out, they marched, they protested," said Stewart Kwoh is the founder and past president of Asian Americans Advancing Justice, and a nationally recognized voice and expert in race relations.

The shootings in El Paso, Dayton and Gilroy brings back a flood of memories. "When I watch the news, when there's a shooting, it brings me back," Ileto's sister Deena told KABC.

"What happens to one group affects every group. And we need to work as brothers and sisters, and as neighbors, against hate crimes against anybody," Kwoh said.

"When there's gun violence," Deena Ileto said, "the bullet doesn't stop because of the color of our skin, or what race or religion we are. It doesn't stop. It's going to kill you. And we want it to stop."

“What we’ve noticed, especially for the Asian Americans who are born here, is that they say that they are Americans and that hate crimes don’t pertain to them,” Ismael told the Daily Bulletin at the 15th anniversary of Ileto's death. “But we have to remind them, ‘Yeah, you’re Asian American, but to any non-Asian American, you’re still an immigrant that came over.’ Just because you don’t hear about it happening doesn’t mean that it is not occurring.”

The Iletos said they never thought they would be as active as they are today, because they operated under the impression that a hate crime would never happen to them.

“Don’t wait until something happens to your loved ones,” Ismael said. “That’s what we did. We stayed out of trouble and we just depended on other people. But it’s a lot harder to stand behind a podium to share the story about losing a loved one."

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