A group of LGBT teens returning home Sunday from Pride seems to have been physically and/or verbally assaulted by two men riding the New York City subway Queens-bound F train as this graphic video shows. At least one of the teens in the video seems to be physically assaulted and at least one member of the group is threatened with murder and rape. The person filming the incident is also threatened. Near the end of the video one of the anti-gay men defends his actions because, he says, “this is America.”
He then seems to say, “I’ll fucking kill you here.”
“Two men were loudly making homophobic comments, such as ‘Today was a scary day for me. There were fags everywhere,'” the YouTube description reads:
When a group of queer youth got on the train, the men proceeded to harass them, stating that the teens made them want to puke and that they would be killed if they were in Iran. The first assailant then threatened to rape them, at which point I took out my phone to document the incident.
Seeing that he was being recorded, the first assailant lunged at me, violently grabbing my arms while trying to steal away my phone. One of the youth took the phone from me temporarily to protect it and told the assailant he shouldn’t attack a woman. When the assailant threatened to punch me, I took the phone back and ran to the other side of the train to push the emergency button and alert the authorities. At this point the second assailant got up and came towards me, grabbing my body and hands to try and get the phone to destroy the evidence. I yelled and told him I was an attorney. An onlooker then got up and stood between the assailants and myself, and another person left to get the train conductor.
A group of people had gathered to stand up to the gay bashers. During this, the second assailant put his hand around the neck of a young queer woman. When the doors opened up at the Roosevelt Ave stop, both assailants fled. I followed them to the station exit while calling 911. One witness had overheard them saying they were on route to Jamaica; they’re likely commuters who regularly take this route.
I uploaded the video to YouTube to see if anyone can identify these men. I was left with bruises and scratches from both assailants which I also documented. If anyone sees them or knows them personally, please contact the authorities. This was a hate crime.
Caution: graphic.
//www.youtube.com/embed/jhtwgMSYVf8