Virginia man charged in baseball bat attack on congressional staff also facing hate crime charge

By MATTHEW BARAKAT and DENISE LAVOIE
Associated Press

FAIRFAX, Va. (AP) — A northern Virginia man charged with attacking two staffers for Rep. Gerry Connolly with a baseball bat is also being charged with a hate crime against another woman less than an hour earlier. Forty-nine-year-old Xuan-Kha Tran Pham was arraigned Tuesday on four counts in Fairfax County General District Court. The hearing was by video hookup from the county jail. Pham refused to appear, so a judge read the charges against him while he huddled under a blanket in his jail cell. The charges also include aggravated wounding and malicious aggravated wounding for the baseball bat attack on two staffers at Connolly’s district office in Fairfax.