Northeast Lincoln neighborhood holds ‘Everyone Belongs Here’ rally

After a traumatic experience left Jeremy Williams car vandalized by a group of teenagers.

His coworkers and friends got together to ignite unity and show that everyone belongs here.

“Automatically if something like that were to happen to you, you’d think it was a bad area of town; so i just wanted to show him, one you don’t have to be scared. You should not be feeling scared or like you don’t belong and two we need our northeast Lincoln neighborhood to make things right,” Brenda Schmidt said. 

Williams, a fourth grade teacher in Lincoln, said he was working as a ride share driver late one night when a group of teenagers approached his vehicle and told him he didn’t belong in their neighborhood.

He immediately knew that they were referencing his race and Williams began to feel uncomfortable.

As he tried to pull away the group began striking his car causing over a thousand dollars in damage.

After hearing about the incident, the neighborhood immediately sprung into action.

“The community outreach has been overwhelming for me. A really bad thing happened but Lincoln has come together and stood up for me and said we are not going to tolerate it and it’s not okay that things like that happen,” Williams said. 

Brenda Schmidt, a coworker and friend of Williams, said this event needs to inspire change throughout the community and encourage people to never let this happen again.

“Showing that what are we going to do after this? What are we going to do? We need to be a little kinder to strangers. We need to make sure everyone knows that they belong. We need to stop and ask questions of people that you don’t know and don’t assume things,” Schmidt said. 

With dozens showing up, even in the rain, the passion and support was overwhelming for Williams and has truly showed him how much love the city has to offer.

“I knew what an amazing school district I was getting into and now I feel like I know what an amazing city Lincoln is as well,” Williams said. 

The Lincoln Police Department is still investigating and are treating the incident as a hate crime.

They have not made any arrests but are asking anyone with information to call 402–441–6000.