FBI Investigating Possible Atlanta Hate Crime

The FBI is looking into a video showing gang members beating a man while shouting anti-gay slurs at him in front of a southwest Atlanta grocery store. “We’re looking into the possibility of it being a federal hate crime,” FBI spokesman Stephen Emmett told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Tuesday. But so far, no victim has come forward. The video, first released on YouTube and WorldHipHop.com and later reported on The Smoking Gun, shows three men pummelling an unsuspecting man coming out of a McDaniel Street store with a barrage of punches, kicks and even a tire. It’s unclear when the incident occurred, but since the video went viral, Atlanta police and other authorities have taken notice. "Along with the Atlanta Police Department, we are working to determine if the actions portrayed in the video violate federal law, including the hate crime statute,” U.S. Attorney Sally Quillian Yates said in a prepared statement emailed to the media Monday night, calling the video “appalling and unacceptable” and asking for community help in identifying the perpetrators. Atlanta Police spokesman Carlos Campos on Monday echoed Yates’ call for action. "We encourage the victim to come forward to discuss the incident with investigators," Campos said in a statement. "The Atlanta Police Department is working to determine more about the attack depicted on this video, including attempting to identify the victim and the perpetrators." Activist Gerald Rose, founder and CEO of New Order National Human Rights Organization, was talking to residents and business owners in the Pittsburgh neighbourhood Tuesday morning. Rose complained that February, which is Black History Month, should be a time that black people are showing unity, not attacking one another. That was a human being who got jumped on for nonsense,” he said. “I’m very upset. I don’t even know why we have Black History Month … and then continuously, in our community we’re killing each other.” Rose said it was inexcusable for there to be no witnesses willing to come forward. "We aren't promised tomorrow anyway," he said. "Why not help go and find who did this?" Devin Barrington-Ward, of the civil action organization Change Atlanta, was with Rose and decried the absence of a state hate crime law, which was struck down in 2004. “We need tougher laws on the books, so that this young man can feel the need to come forward and not live his life in fear,” Ward said. Anyone with information about the incident shown in the video is asked to call Zone 3 police officers at 404-624-0674 or to call anonymously to Crime Stoppers Atlanta at 404-577-8477.