HAPPY VALLEY -- Neighbors expressed bewilderment as much as shock Thursday after a Vietnamese American family suffered racial harassment and threats as they began moving into their new home.

Jami Onchi, 32, who lives down the street, said ethnic diversity was one reason she and her husband moved to the neighborhood. "My husband is Japanese, and we have half-Japanese children," Onchi said. "I can only say this is extremely strange."

On Monday, vandals spray-painted racial slurs on Sang Huynh and his family's new home and left a note threatening to burn it down. The FBI and Clackamas County authorities are investigating the incident as a hate crime.

"It's just terrible because we just moved here, and it's my dream area," said Phong Tran, Sang Huynh's wife. "How were we supposed to know this would happen?"

Tran said she suspects the vandals who defaced her home live close by, but the family has no clue who they could be.

"We don't have any enemies here," said daughter Lisa Huynh, 14, who will be a freshman at Clackamas High School. "If they were mature, they'd talk to us in person."

Mayor Rob Wheeler called the incident totally unacceptable and disturbing, "especially in a city where nearly 9 percent of residents are of Asian descent."

"It is such an uncharacteristic act to have happened in our city," Wheeler said. "We have families from many ethnic backgrounds who have lived peacefully in Happy Valley for years without problems. This is clearly the work of a disturbed individual or misguided vandals."

On Monday afternoon, Huynh, his wife and their children discovered that someone spray-painted racial slurs on the exterior of their new home on Southeast Catina Place, a quiet residential street with mostly two-story homes.

The family also found a book of matches next to a clear plastic bottle filled with what police think is gasoline. The accompanying handwritten note said, "Last warning. We will burn your house down if we have to."

Other notes said, "LEAVE" and "Welcome to the neighborhood.

The family immediately contacted police.

Under state law, the graffiti and threats appear to be Class A misdemeanor hate crimes, because they were motivated by race.

Class A misdemeanors usually are punishable by a maximum of one year in jail and a $6,250 fine. However, if two or more people committed the crimes together, they would become a Class C felony, punishable by a maximum of five years in prison and a $125,000 fine.

If prosecuted in U.S. District Court as civil rights violations, federal sentencing guidelines allow judges to impose enhanced sentences that could mean as long as an additional two years in prison. The U.S. Department of Justice also could file civil lawsuits alleging civil rights violations.

Happy Valley officials said residents have been calling and e-mailing the city to express sympathy for the family. Others who wish to send cards may deliver them to City Hall, 16000 S.E. Misty Dr.

Detective Jim Strovink, the Clackamas County sheriff's spokesman, urged anyone with information about the incident to call the sheriff's confidential tip line at 503-723-4949. Confidential text messages can be sent to CRIMES (274637 on a cell phone keypad), with the keyword "CCSO" as the first word in the message.

Huynh, a machinist at Boeing of Portland, and his wife, Tran, who owns a Southeast Portland convenience store, both were born in Vietnam. They became naturalized U.S. citizens about 10 years ago. Their four children were born in the United States.

"They obviously were trying to scare us," said son Brian Huynh, who will be an eighth-grader at North Clackamas Middle School. "But we're just trying to stay positive."

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