A woman who suffered 60 per cent burns to her body says she was set on fire in a racist attack by three men who wrote “KKK” on her car.
Sharmeka Moffitt had already put out the flames herself when police responded to her 911 call on Sunday night.
She had been exercising alone on a park trail in Winnsboro, Louisiana when the attack occurred.
Sharmeka Moffitt suffered 60 per cent burns to her body in the attack
Louisiana State Police spokesman Lt Juie Lewis told AP the FBI was investigating the attack as a possible hate crime, but that no arrests had yet been made.
Lt Lewis confirmed "KKK" - an apparent reference to the white supremacist group, the Ku Klux Klan - was smeared on the bonnet of her car.
She said Moffitt had described her attackers in her emergency call as wearing white hoods or hats. Earlier rumours Moffitt's assailants had been provoked by the fact she was wearing an Obama T-shirt were dismissed.
Moffitts sister Michelle, who rushed to her aid, says the word "n*****" was also written on her car.
She told The Shreveport Times: "She called 911, then she called me. She said she had been burned, she had been set on fire.
”I stayed on the phone until I got (to the park) even though she wasn’t able to say anything.”
Her mother Edna Moffitt, told a news conference her 20-year-old daughter was set to have surgery.
She told reporters: “They want to take the dead skin off and place other skin there if they can.
“I have no idea who did it…I want them to pay for what they did to her.”
Moffitt is in a critical condition in LSU Medical Center Shreveport.
More than 26,000 people have joined a Facebook page entitled Prayers for Sharmeka Moffitt.