(one of the alleged dumbshits)
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - Police are very confident that the two teens who turned themselves in over the killing of a homeless man and the beatings of two others are the perpetrators, a police spokeswoman told NBC?s ?Today? show on Monday.
?We?re very confident we have the right two,? Fort Lauderdale Police Department Detective Kathy Collins said, noting that police received more than 100 tips from the public.
She described the teens, both from Plantation, Fla., as being ?very low key? when they entered a police station with their attorneys on Sunday.
Both will be charged with the murder of Norris Gaynor and aggravated battery for the beating of Jacques Pierre, police Capt. Michael Gregory said. Hooks is expected to appear in court later Monday.
A surveillance video that captured images of Pierre?s beating with a baseball bat was instrumental in the case.
The attacks took place last Thursday, and investigators made contact with the families of the suspects within a day, police said.
The teens are also suspects in the beating of a third man, Raymond Perez, 49, whose case remains under investigation, Gregory said.
Others involved?
Collins urged the public to continue providing tips on any homeless beatings they might know about, suggesting that those could lead to additional arrests.
The attack on Pierre, 58, took place on the Fort Lauderdale campus of Florida Atlantic University, where he had been sleeping on a bench shortly after 1 a.m. Thursday.
Gaynor, 45, was killed 90 minutes later and just a few blocks away. Gaynor died from severe head injuries, authorities said.
?It?s senseless. If you look at these kids, it was almost like it was fun and games for them,? police Officer Scott Russell said.
The teens invoked the right to remain silent when taken into custody. They were being held at separate facilities pending official charges from a grand jury, Gregory said.
Gregory said police were investigating whether the teens were involved in other beatings and if they had accomplices. ?We do know there have been other assaults of homeless in Fort Lauderdale,? Gregory said.
NBC reported that the Salvation Army was opening an emergency shelters for the homeless in Fort Lauderdale, something the group usually does only on extremely cold nights.
There were 105 attacks on homeless in 2004, including 25 deaths, according to the Washington, D.C.-based National Coalition for the Homeless. The majority of attackers were young men between the ages of 16 and 25.
Four teenagers pleaded guilty last month to fatally beating a 53-year-old homeless man in Daytona Beach in May. They await sentencing next month. A fifth teen still faces an aggravated battery charge and is free on bail.
\'Tip of the iceberg\'
What made Friday\'s crime unusual, advocates for the homeless said, wasn\'t that it was committed, but that it was captured on videotape.
"We think it\'s the tip of the iceberg," said Michael O\'Neill of the National Coalition for the Homeless.
In a report on hate crimes against the homeless published in mid-2005, the organization said it believes many cases go unreported or unpublicized because many homeless people are mentally ill or addicts, fear retaliation or are frustrated with the police. As a result, the report says, it is difficult to assess the true magnitude of the problem.
O\'Neill told MSNBC.com there was an escalation in violence against homeless people after two young men produced a series of movies, starting with "Bum Fights" in 2001 in which they filmed homeless people they had persuaded to do humiliating and dangerous things in exchange for drugs, small change or food. The video producers at first faced seven felony counts and four misdemeanor charges in connection with production of the videos, but ultimately were sentenced to 250 hours of community service.
"There\'s been a lot of copycat crimes," O\'Neill said.
In an interview with the Sun-Sentinel, a Fort Lauderdale advocate for the homeless said beating homeless people is quite common in the area.
"It\'s one of the shameful secrets we have, the beating of homeless for sport," said Marti Forman, CEO of the Cooperative Feeding Program, told the newspaper. "It\'s a recreation thing, it\'s an initiation for gangs and fraternities."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10834294/wtf?! these worthless pricks should be killed.. :sigh:
puking on bums=legit
throwing snowballs at bums=kosher
beating bums with baseball bats=NOT COOL