Sorry to bring you so much violent, ugly news this week but I think it’s important that these incidents get as much visibility as possible.
Police in New Mexico report that a woman and a gay man were kidnapped and beaten for hours last weekend during a party at a mobile home in rural Edgewood.
The two victims met up with another woman and one of their attackers before driving to the party. That woman left the party early, but confirmed to police that those who attacked the two victims used anti-gay language toward the man and taped part of the party on a cell phone.
After reportedly threatening to throw their victims into a yard full of “several large barking dogs” they took them to a camper parked in the yard of the mobile home and that is where an all-night torture began:
While some of the partygoers tied up the gay man with rope and began hitting him, “Uriah told them that this was a kidnapping and they were not going to die yet,” according to the warrant. A female from the party lifted the woman’s head and kicked her in the face, the warrant says. The woman said she felt her nose break, the warrant says.
“(The woman) was not tied up, but was held in the camper for most of the night while all of the male subjects kept hitting, kicking, slapping and knocking (the gay man) down,” the warrant states. “The male subjects would knock (the gay man) down and if he did not get up off of the ground within a certain count or if he would make any noise, they would jump on him, hitting and kicking him.
“This continued all night until the sun was about to come up.”
Said Prosecutor Donna Dagnall: “It’s pretty clear to us that his homosexuality was the reason for the beating.”
The male victim suffered “bleeding on the brain and a concussion as well as facial lacerations and bruising” and has been released from a hospital. The female victim did not require hospitalization, according to reports.
Two men, age 17 and 21, are in custody, and have been charged with “two counts of kidnapping, aggravated battery causing great bodily injury, false imprisonment and conspiracy.” Another has not yet been apprehended. The three will be charged with hate crimes.
The most high-profile hate crime case of this kind in New Mexico occurred in February 2005 when James Maestas was beaten unconscious in a motel parking lot near Santa Fe. Just this June, Maestas’ attackers were sent to rehabilitation rather than prison. Upon sentencing, the judge said: “You both would be ruined if I sent you to prison. I would be throwing you away. I don’t want to do that.”
3 Charged in Beating of Gay Man [free new mexican]
