The Boys Star Karen Fukuhara Says She Was Randomly Attacked: People 'Need to Be Held Accountable'

The Boys actress Karen Fukuhara is sharing details of a recent scary encounter during which she was attacked by a stranger.

Fukuhara, 30, called for an end to anti-Asian hate crimes in a lengthy Instagram post in which she said she was randomly struck in the head while walking to a cafe this week.

"I rarely share about my private life but something happened today that I thought was important," she began. "I was walking to a cafe for some coffee and a man struck me in the back of my head. It came out of nowhere."

"We made no eye contact before, I wasn't doing anything out of the ordinary. It came to my surprise and my hat flew off," she wrote. "By the time I looked back, he was a few feet away from me (he must have kept walking after hitting me)."

Fukuhara said she "thought of confronting" her attacker, but told her followers, "he started coming towards me and I didn't think it was worth the risk." She added, "After a few seconds of staring at each other, and him yelling at me, he eventually walked away."

The actress said her scary encounter was the first time she had been physically targeted, explaining, "racial slurs and hurtful actions have been directed at me in the past."

"I write this, because I've had conversations with multi-racial friends of mine that had no idea these hate crimes happen to everyday, regular people – people that they share meals with," she said. "I felt it was important to raise awareness."

Fukuhara said she knew she "got lucky," explaining that her alleged attacker could have continued to physically attack her, or could have been carrying a weapon. The actress said she was now considering enrolling in self-defense courses after "the shock" of the incident.

"But why is this something we as 'victims' have to think about? What satisfaction are these perpetrators getting from hitting women, Asians, the ELDERLY? They need to be held accountable. What can we do as a community to prevent these horrible crimes?"

Fukuhara's friends and costars from The Boys shared their support for her in the comment section of her post, with Chace Crawford writing, "F this person!! Hope you're ok this is awful. ❤️"

Jack Quaid added, "Karen thank you for sharing your experience. I'm so sorry that happened to you. Love you. Here if you need anything.❤️"

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Actress Olivia Munn, who also shared her own call to action amidst the rise in anti-Asian hate crimes, also offered words of support to Fukuhara, commenting on her post, "I'm so grateful you're safe ❤️❤️❤️."

Crimes targeting the Asian American community reached new highs during the COVID-19 pandemic. A report from the Center for the Study of Hate & Extremism at California State University in San Bernardino found that anti‐Asian hate crimes had increased 164% in the first quarter of 2021 over the same period in 2020.

In 2020, the FBI stated that reported anti-Asian incidents rose 77% that year compared to 2019, jumping to a total of 279.