MPD Tracking Anti-LGBT Assaults
Police count five incidents, ranging from beatings to groping, with bias elements in past two weeks
Since Sept. 11, five different District residents have been approached by strangers on the street and physically attacked, groped, threatened or robbed while having homophobic slurs yelled at them.
According to Metropolitan Police Department reports, all of the victims were alone at the time of the attacks. There is no indication any of the events are related.
On Sept. 11, a black male in his late 30s, further described as 6 feet and 1 inch tall, 180 to 190 pounds, approached a gay man walking through the 2200 block of 14th Street NW around 2:10 a.m. The suspect allegedly approached the victim and said, ”You faggot piece of shit,” before striking the man with his fists. The suspect then fled the scene and was last seen near the intersection of 14th and T Streets NW.
Police responded to the scene and took photos of the victim’s injuries, which were relatively minor. An ambulance responded to the scene of the crime, but the man refused treatment.
Three days later, in the 5000 block of 13th Street NW, a block from the West Educational Campus in the Sixteenth Street Heights neighborhood, a transgender woman was approached by a man who making derogatory about her gender identity. He then assaulted her and stole her purse.
That same day, Sept. 14, near the intersection of 30th Street and Southern Avenue SE, in the city’s Buena Vista neighborhood near the Maryland border, a man told police he was approached by another man who harassing him with anti-gay epithets and threatened with a gun.
Also that night, near the intersection of 7th and H Streets NW, in the city’s Chinatown neighborhood, a male suspect approached a transgender woman and attempted to engage her in conversation before groping her and grabbing her crotch area.
And on Sept. 22, in the city’s Skyland neighborhood, near the eastern edge of Fort Stanton Park, a male suspect attacked a man in the 2700 block of Bruce Place SE, yelling homophobic slurs at the victim while repeatedly hitting him with a baseball bat. The victim was taken to a local hospital for treatment.
No arrests have been made. Anyone with information in any of these cases should contact MPD at 202-727-9099. Callers may request to remain anonymous. They may also choose to anonymously text MPD by sending a message to 50411.
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