Mothers Who Vandalized Arizona Mosque With Their Kids Arrested For Third-Degree Burglary

Two Arizona women were booked into the Tempe City Jail on Thursday afternoon on suspicion of felony third-degree burglary, after investigation into theft and vandalism at a Tempe mosque revealed the two women, along with their three children, ransacked the property of the Islamic Community Center earlier this month, an act that they recorded on Facebook live, Huffington post reported.

Tahnee Gonzales and Elizabeth Dauenhauer recorded their exploits in a disturbing trip to the mosque in order to “collect as much information” and “expose the evil that is happening in our backyards.”

The video posted on March 4 by Gonzales shows her friend Dauenhauer and the three kids trespassing into the mosque’s property while spewing hateful statements.

In the video, one of them can be heard saying, “look at this mosque….this ugly mosque in our backyard in America,” and then the women proceed to rip the flyers off the bulletin board and steal materials from the hallway, all the while the children are listening closely to the adults.

One of the kid quips “they smell like goat,” as they walk around the property, while the women continue to insult Muslims by calling them “devil Satan worshippers,” who are out to destroy America.

The women then stop to take pictures in the property, where the little girl instructs one of the boys to put his “thumbs down” and pouts as the group poses for a photo.

“Be careful, because Muslims are waiting to rape you,” the girl whispers down to one of the boys in the video.

One of the videos posted by Gonzales was taken down but was reposted on a number of other accounts.

Det. Liliana Duran of the Tempe Police Department told Huffington Post the women might also be charged for a hate crime along with the felony burglary charges.

AZcentral, a local newspaper affiliated with USA Today, reported that the women were part of the Patriot Movement the Southern Poverty Law Center described as a “fringe group being energized and influenced by the president’s over-the-top rhetoric on immigrants and Muslims.” The disconcerting video comes at a time when anti-Islam sentiment in the nation is on the rise.

Huffington Post spoke to imam Ahmad Al-Akoum of the Islamic Community Center of Tempe, who was deeply disturbed by the footage.

Akoum told Huffington Post: “What really affected me the most is seeing those young children getting real-life lessons in hate, that was the thing that made me really, really upset with those people. Those innocent 5-, 6-year-old children are now really learning hate from their parents. It’s really disheartening.”

Imraan Siddiqi, the executive director of the Arizona chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations told Huffington Post: “The most jarring thing about the video is clearly the fact there are children involved, indoctrinated to hate people based off their belief system or what they look like or the color they are. You can see that unfolding in real time.”

The comments made by the children and their parents in the video shook the Muslim community in Arizona, report said.