Gay Man Attacked by Mob in D.C.; Three Arrested

Washington, D.C.'s Metropolitan Police Department has arrested three people in connection with an attack on a gay man early Sunday.

Karl Craven and his boyfriend were walking between two bars on U Street when they stopped for a moment to talk. "He was leaning against me and a few guys started yelling 'faggot' at him and started to swing at him," Craven wrote on a GoFundMe page aimed at raising money the medical expenses of his boyfriend, who is uninsured. "It was all a quick blur but next thing you know there was literally a mob of 15 guys beating him. They came out of nowhere and I was powerless to stop them, all I could do was jump on him to try protect him and scream help. I don't remember how long they kept beating him for. They stole his phone and my wallet. They chipped a major part of his front tooth and he had to get multiple stitches on his lip." The boyfriend's name was not disclosed.

The attack took place at 1:44 a.m., according to a police department press release quoted by the Washington Blade. Police have arrested Marcus Britt, 19, of Fort Washington, Md., and two juvenile males. They are charged with robbery by force and violence. The department's LGBT liaison is assisting with the case.

There were at least two other attacks on gay men in that area last year, the Blade reports.

Also this weekend in Washington, a man with a gun threatened transgender women near Casa Ruby, a social services agency focusing on trans women of color. Around 6 p.m. Saturday, the man, sitting in a vehicle in the agency's parking lot, told a passerby, "I want my dick sucked, go get me one of those [T words]," according to the Blade. The bystander told the man the parking lot was private, and the man drove away.

He had also brandished the gun at two Casa Ruby clients in the parking lot of a pizza restaurant across the street and said, "You will suck my dick." They managed to run away, the paper reports. Casa Ruby CEO Ruby Corado said she plans to install a new security system at the agency.

The threat came just two days after the murder of trans woman Zoe Spears in Fairmount Heights, Md., near the Maryland-D.C. border. Another trans woman, Ashanti Carmon, was killed in the same suburb in March.