A family found two swastikas and an obscenity spray painted on their South Side home Friday afternoon.

Debbie Rowe said she pulled into her driveway on Jackson Street, spotted the graffiti and thought "What is that? Oh. I know what sign that is."

The swastikas, one about 2-feet square and the other about 3-feet square, were in brown spray paint on the small white house. Below the blue-trimmed window the words "f--- you" were painted in gold, a squiggle near the words may have been another swastika. There also appeared to be a light splatter of purple paint on the house.

Billings Police Sgt. J.R. Chapman said police treated the graffiti as a crime scene but they had no suspects Friday night. Investigators will try to match the painting to other graffiti and marks left around town, Chapman said. Police did not know any motivation for the graffiti because they don't know why the Rowes' house was selected.

"It could have racial overtones, but we don't know," Chapman said.

Debbie Rowe said there were no indications that the family might be targeted for racial or any type of graffiti. Her husband, Aldo, is a tall, dark-skinned man who was raised in Panama. Debbie Rowe is of Native American descent. They have two sons.

The Rowes, some of their friends and Chapman all said they found it ironic that the swastikas were painted backward.

The family has lived in the Jackson Street home about two years. Whoever painted on their house had to climb a fence and get past the family dog, which the Rowes admit is fairly friendly.

"It could be random vandalism. We can't leave that out," Aldo Rowe said. "But why not some other house?"

Several neighbors stopped by while the Rowes waited outside for police to arrive. They said they were appalled by the swastikas and offered to keep an eye open in the neighborhood. One man said the graffiti was not on the house when he drove by at about 1 p.m. The family left home Friday morning, for work and school, and Debbie Rowe found it after 4 p.m.

Debbie Rowe said people need to be educated about tolerance and that the incident is disappointing. The family has lived on the East Coast where racially motivated crimes are more common and they have a "whole spectrum" of friends who have been targeted there and in Colorado.

Aldo Rowe, who works in home mortgages and is a community development representative for a large bank, called the incident a surprise. He had heard about racism here before moving to Billings in the summer of 2000 but had not experienced any incidents.

"This is my first experience, I really don't know what to do to tell you the truth," Aldo Rowe said.

Debbie Rowe said it was in Billings where she first heard the term "apple" - a disparaging remark toward a Native American meaning that he or she is "red on the outside and white on the inside."

Rowe, who was raised by a family of Norwegian descent said she just laughed and retorted, "What are you? A pear?"

The Rowe children, Stephen, 11, and Bryce, 9, go to Catholic school and were still in pleated dress pants as they surveyed the graffiti.

"It's scary," Stephen said. His class at St. Francis School talked about Hitler on Friday, but Stephen said he didn't recognize the sign.

"I just knew how evil he was," he said.

After Rowe called her husband about the swastikas, she called 911. That was about 4:30, and Aldo Rowe made a second call at about 5:10. Their slow response was "shameful," Rowe said.

Chapman, who went to the Rowes' home, said it was more than 90 minutes after the first call. He said a priority was set for the call at the dispatch center, as is standard, but because it was not a crime in progress other calls were answered first, and the patrol car assigned to that area was not available.

Racial minorities have been targeted in Billings. Members of a local skinhead group convicted of violating the civil rights of racial minorities in Billings are in prison. Their convictions were upheld last fall by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The case involved an attack on three minority persons in Pioneer Park on July 29, 2000. The attackers were members of the Montana Front Working Class Skinheads, a racist group, who were "patrolling'" the park for racial minorities and Jews.

A swastika was painted on the Terrace Apartments in 1994 after the Billings community unified against hate crimes in late 1993. A local Jewish family, the Schnitzers, had a piece of cinder block thrown through a front window decorated with Stars of David, a Menorah and "Happy Chanukah."