SAN DIEGO (Border Report) — On July 18, 1984, a man named James Huberty walked into a McDonald’s restaurant in San Ysidro, California killing 21 people including an 8-month-old baby boy.
Huberty, an unemployed security guard, had told his wife he was “going hunting, hunting for humans.”
“It breaks my heart. I’m definitely looking at the world differently,” said Charlie Minn, a movie producer.
Eight years ago, Minn made a documentary called “77 Minutes,” named after the amount of time Huberty spent killing his victims inside and outside the restaurant.
Minn says the shooting was nothing more than a hate crime.
“He knew there would be a lot of Mexican people there, and his wife even admitted this and he shot 40 people and killed 21,” Minn said. “I thought we should re-release ’77 Minutes’ because of the landmark 40-year anniversary. The victims, survivors and families have been forgotten in my opinion.”
He believes those who aren’t familiar with the massacre will learn something from his film, which has been described as extremely graphic and not for children.
“The documentary is a perfect platform spread awareness and let people know what happened even if it happened before you were living.”
Minn regrets massacres, like the one in San Ysidro four decades ago, keep happening.
“We haven’t learned a darn thing in 40 years, and it keeps happening. We’re averaging one per day and the police response is horrendous. Look what happened in Uvalde, ’77 minutes,’ just like San Ysidro, we haven’t learned a darn thing in 40 years.”
The McDonald’s restaurant where the tragedy took place has since been torn down.
A satellite campus for a community college now sits on the site with a memorial honoring the victims outside the building.
Border Report will cover the anniversary extensively in the days leading up to July 18 with interviews and accounts from those who survived the ordeal.
