Another Gay Bashing incident, this time in D.C.

[NorthCarolina]

Man in critical condition after suspected gay bashing
D.C. police reviewing video from surveillance cameras
By LOU CHIBBARO JR, Washington Blade | Sep 11, 3:58 PM

A gay Maryland man was in critical condition at Howard University Hospital after he and a friend were attacked and beaten Sunday as they left their car to visit D.C. gay club BeBar.

Tony Randolph Hunter of Hyattsville, Md., remained in the intensive care unit at Howard on Thursday, friends said. He was being treated for severe head wounds.

The second victim, identified by friends as Trevor Carter of Clinton, Md., was treated and released from a hospital the night of the attack.

D.C. police have labeled the attack along the 1300 block of Eighth Street N.W. a “robbery with potential hate/bias overtones based on the victims’ actual or perceived sexual orientation.”

Acting D.C. police Lt. Brett Parson, who oversees the department’s Gay & Lesbian Liaison Unit, said detectives were investigating the case as a potential hate crime due to the incident’s proximity to BeBar, a well-know gay bar.

According to a police report, both victims were exiting their car, which was parked about one block from BeBar, when four young, black men approached them. “The victims were beaten and their personal property was taken,” the report says. “The suspects fled on foot.”

Eric Rhodes, a friend of both victims, said Carter told him the attackers approached the two victims seconds after they left their car.

“He said four guys came up and said, ‘What’s up, what’s up,’” Rhodes said. “Then the guys started swinging.”

Rhodes said Carter told him that he swung back at the attackers before running from the scene to seek help, and Carter assumed that Hunter also was running from the scene.

Rhodes said Carter learned a short time later, though, that Hunter had been knocked unconscious by the attackers.

Parson said Thursday that the lead investigator in the case told him Hunter was

Read more here: http://www.washblade.com/thelatest/thelatest.cfm?blog_id=20965

[Mabus]

1. .

I really hope they catch these guys and are able to prosecute them. God damn it. Why should people live in fear because of who they are and where they are going.

[NorthCarolina]

2. I doubt there are many gay folks, couples especially, that don't

have the thought of incidents like this constantly in the back of their mind. Unable to even hold hands in public for fear of physical attack.

[Mabus]

3. Yep, no PDA

I heard it from my parents say when I was a kid it as a biracial couple and from my gay roommates and friends. And, myself, as clearly biracial woman, I know what it feels like to worry about getting my ass kicked for no other reason than the color of my skin.

My bottom line is, why should two people in love have to hide their feelings? It's beautiful. The answer, of course, sickens me. Because we're perceived as being different, we're the dreaded "other" and therefore aren't human.

[Karl_Bonner_1982]

4. How many more years before gay PDA starts breaking through more?

Seriously, how much longer will this stupid closet crap have to go on before we start seeing more same-sex hand holding, especially among males?

[dsc]

6. It is changing for younger gays

At my school you can occassionally see males engaged in PDA with each other in the early morning. At least you could last year, the couple doing it contained a senior so only one is at school this year. I would think that couple would continue to do so in public.

[Falcon_Lights1916]

5. My Spouse and I....

live constantly with this fear. We don't express affection in public for fear that we would end up bashed. The first time we kissed in public was when we got our wedding license in Windsor, Ontario, last year. It's awful to have to live this way and even worse to actually be gay-bashed, but this is the result of the constant hatred and fear spewed by the religious right.

[littlebit]

7. I spent almost five weeks in a coma

after being attacked outside of a club 16 years ago. I haven't been to a club since then. I keep thinking that as the years go by things are getting better for us. But no matter how much things change some things still remain the same.

[dsc]

8. damn man I am sorry

But for the grace of God, go I, and many other gays. I got a minor beating once, treated and released kind of thing, but to this day I still hold my car keys a certain way when it is dark out and I am alone.

[TechBear_Seattle]

9. Unfortunately, there is quite a bit of gay bashing in DC

The only difference is that, this time, it did not happen on Capitol Hill.

I hope the victims recover, and the perpetrators are strung up by their testicles.