George Zimmerman has been acquitted of all charges after the February 2012 murder of 17-year old Trayvon Martin. The verdict handed down this past Sunday sparked protests across the country. Yet Soul singer Lester Chambers, 73, found himself on the wrong side of a Zimmerman supporter one evening before the verdict.
The legendary singer of the Chambers Brothers was performing at the Hayward Russell City Blues Festival in Hayward, California.
According to Chambers’ wife and eyewitnesses, the singer was performing Curtis Mayfield’s “People Get Ready,” which he dedicted to the slain teenager.
Family members told police a woman now identified as 43-year-old Dinalynn Andrews Potter of Barstow, apparently yelled, “it’s all your fault” before shoving the senior entertainer to the floor.
Kurt Kangas, a friend of Chambers, who ran onstage along with others to help stated,
“She had a crazed look in her eye. I saw the devil there.”
“She must have been an acrobat. She did it in one leap. He didn’t see her coming,” Chambers’ wife, Lola added to local newspaper The Mercury News.
The family is reportedly pressing police to charge Potter with a hate crime. In the meantime, she was arrested on suspicion of battery before she was released.
Chambers’ son, Dylan, shared photos of his father’s injuries on Facebook Saturday evening, posting, “Dad… A bruised rib muscle and nerve damage and he is sore all over.”
