After Autistic Boy Gets Hate Mail, Community Rallies

A small town east of Toronto has rallied around the family of an autistic boy that was sent hate mail so vicious they feared for the 13-year-old's safety. The boy has been spending summer mornings with his grandmother, who received a horrifyingly cruel anonymous letter complaining about Maxwell Begley's "noise polluting whaling," calling him "a hindrance to everyone," and urging the grandmother to "do the right thing and move or euthanize him," the Toronto Star reports.

Police say they are investigating the letter, whose writer claims she is the mother of "normal children" in the community. When a TV crew arrived at the family's home Sunday night, more than 120 people, including some families with autistic children, gathered to show their support, reports the Globe and Mail. Begley's mother says she hopes the letter-writer is charged. "If they don’t like different people, they should move away and be a hermit, because life is full of unexpected stuff, and that’s what makes it interesting," she says. (More Ontario stories.)