Assault on gay men at Seaside bonfire probed as hate crime

[stevedeshazer]

http://www.kgw.com/news-local/stories/kgw_032409_news_seaside_gay_beating.6860ad95.html

SEASIDE, Ore. -- Two gay men were badly beaten at a beach party in Seaside this weekend and police said they’re pursuing assault and hate crime charges in the incident.
Seaside hate crime investigation

Police said they were called to the Seaside Best Western early Sunday morning at around 3 a.m., after two men said they were assaulted at a bonfire on the main Seaside beach.

The victims, Sam and Kevin, were both 22 years old and Western Washington state residents; one was from Bothell and the other from Issaquah, Seaside Police Chief Bob Gross said.

The two men asked that their last names be withheld.

----

video @ link

[stevedeshazer]

1. I hope they catch the perpetrators.

Bastards.

[MadHound]

2. I'm not seeing the hate crime angle.

The article simply states that they were jumped by three or four men dressed in black. No reference to slurs, statements, anything that would make this a hate crime. Perhaps there is more information elsewhere that would clarify why this is being labeled a hate crime, but from what I've seen, there's not enough there to label it as such.

[marmar]

3. Perhaps they were holding hands or doing other things couples do........

..... The fact that they weren't robbed suggests to me that this was a hate crime.

[MadHound]

4. Perhaps, like I said, we simply don't have that information

And judging from what info we do have, it certainly doesn't look like a hate crime. I've known people who've gotten the shit beaten out of them simply for being in the wrong place at the wrong time, no robbery involved.

Frankly, the fact that these perps were all dressed in black seems like this was a premeditated attack, that they knew they were going to attack somebody, and these two simply walked right into it, nothing to do with hate, just one of those wrong place, wrong time deals.