A scenario that escalated from racist slurs to an attempted murder charge in Carmacks is not indicative of what the community is really like, says the town's mayor.

"There's no room for prejudice," Mayor Elaine Wyatt said in an interview last week after learning the details of the case against Antoine Pierre.

"There's no room for bigotry. I don't think it's the majority of the community, and I'm sorry that it escalated to this point."

The 31-year-old Pierre, visiting the Yukon from Montreal, was charged with aggravated assault and attempted murder last June after a fight broke out in the Carmacks bar.

Pierre was accused of stabbing a man who had been harassing and threatening him almost constantly for the short time he was in the village.

Witnesses testified Eric Gulstad had threatened to shoot Pierre, his friend and fellow Montrealer Ernst Barthelemy, and anyone else who befriended them simply because the two men were black.

The witnesses told the court Pierre and Barthelemy did nothing to warrant the attacks, which began with words but quickly intensified.

"It certainly doesn't reflect how the people in the town generally treat newcomers," Wyatt said of the incident. "The fact it all happened in a bar doesn't help matters."

After just two weeks in Carmacks, the tension came to a violent climax.

A friend of Gulstad's, Bobby Gage, punched Barthelemy and the two started fighting.

Pierre tried to break it up, Gulstad jumped into the fray, Pierre took out his knife and Gulstad was wounded.

Pierre was ultimately acquitted by Judge Michael Cozens, who said in his reasons for judgment that "trouble came to Mr. Pierre."

Charges were not laid against Gage nor Gulstad, and neither of the two Montrealers provided statements about the harassment they suffered, according to RCMP spokesman Sgt. Mark Groves.

"Often times things come up in the trial that are not told to police when they are investigating," he said when asked why only Barthelemy and Pierre were arrested.

Some Carmacks residents have anonymously weighed in on the issue, via the Internet.

"These racist men are transits that are not even from Carmacks and act in that manner to make our peaceful quiet town look bad," wrote one woman identified as Yukongirl.

"I knew this (sic) two men that came to visit the Yukon and they are very nice young guys who wanted no trouble. Transits in our community should go back to where they come from or even ban from here. Racist people should be the one to have served 90 days. Good Luck Antoine and Ernest. Your friends in Carmacks."

Although Pierre and Barthelemy could have taken more precautions than they did, by taking refuge in the police detachment, for instance, or locking themselves in their cabin, the judge said the two men had a right as citizens to move and socialize freely around the community.

He did say Pierre's decision to tuck a knife into his waistband before heading to the bar was not the wisest thing he could have done, adding that had he worn the knife on a holster at his belt, he would have been entirely without fault.

While Pierre chose to fight the charges against him, Barthelemy pleaded guilty to assault and spent three months in jail.

"I'm glad if it was that bad that they were vindicated when they were in court," Wyatt said after the judgment. "I feel sorry for the gentleman who did serve a sentence."

The mayor said race relations in the town are generally friendly, with the people of the Little Salmon-Carmacks First Nation living side-by-side with the non-aboriginal community.

"Considering the makeup of the community, we work well together," Wyatt said.

Asked if she intends to address the incident in her capacity as mayor, Wyatt said she doesn't know what she could do.

"All you can do is hope that when this comes out, they'll be shamed into not continuing that kind of behaviour."