Biker returns to rousing welcome at a suburban Chicago pier

WINNETKA, Ill. (AP) - The Labor Day weekend bike ride for Otis Campbell was different from one he took in August, when he was harassed and threatened by area resident Irene Donoshaytis for being on a Winnetka beach pier with friends.

People at Saturday's bike ride near Lake Michigan kept saying, 'œWelcome.'ť However, Campbell says he didn't feel unwelcome, even after Donoshaytis accosted him. In the now widely circulated video Campbell took of the encounter, the woman tells him to 'œgo back to where you're from.'ť He lives in Skokie.

'œAll your Black friends get judged every day,'ť Campbell, using a microphone and speaker, told the group riding with him. ``This happened. Now is the time to stand up against it.'ť

Campbell says he regularly rides his Schwinn through the towns north of Chicago. One white woman insisting he wasn't welcome did not make him question what he believed about himself or his belonging, he said.

By the time riders took off on the trail toward the pier, there were more than 75 of them. Dozens more waited at the pier.

Donoshaytis, 65, of Northfield, is accused of aggressively confronting Campbell and two other Black people who were riding bicycles near the pier. Defense attorney Jeffrey Fagan says the incident ``amounts to a misunderstanding between the parties that was escalated based on the timing of where we are as a culture,'ť