Mosque pays off debts of man who spray painted hateful messages on their building in 2016

A mosque in Arkansas has paid off the debts of a man who was caught on camera spray painting hateful messages on their building in October 2016.

Arkansas Matters reports that Masjid Al Salam in the city of Fort Smith ponied up $1,700 to pay off court fines imposed on Abraham Davis, the man who vandalized their building just over a year ago with messages such as "F*ck you, f*ck Islam" and "Go home."

The reason the mosque paid off Davis' remaining fees was because he has been having financial troubles and faced a possible six years of jail time if he didn't pay his fees.

Louay Nassri, the president of Al Salam, tells Arkansas Matters that he has forgiven Davis, and that he didn't want his hateful actions to punish him for his whole life.

"We didn't want him to go to jail for six years," he explains. "After all that he had been through, we didn't want him sitting on the severe financial stress. And like I told him, we want him to have a much better future."

Nassri also says that Davis has apologized for his actions, and has already done community service to atone for what he did.

"If he would've known who we are, he wouldn't of done this," Nassri says. "If we would've known his troubles with us, we would've tried to help him. Communication is extremely important. Education is extremely important."

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