Three men
convicted of beating a New York City gay man and then
chasing him onto a highway where he was struck by a
car and killed were sentenced to prison on Tuesday,
prosecutors said.
All three had
been part of what prosecutors called a hate-inspired
robbery scheme.
On October 8,
2006, they found Michael Sandy in an Internet chat room
frequented by gay men, lured him out to Brooklyn's remote
Plum Beach with a promise of a date, and then attacked
him. When Sandy tried to escape, he was hit by a car
on the Belt Parkway.
Anthony
Fortunato, 21, who had told jurors they shouldn't convict
him of a hate crime because he's gay, was sentenced to
seven to 21 years in prison for second-degree
manslaughter as a hate crime and attempted petit
larceny.
John Fox, 20, was
sentenced to seven to 21 years in prison for
second-degree manslaughter as a hate crime and attempted
robbery as a hate crime.
Ilya Shurov, 21,
who pleaded guilty, was sentenced to 17 1/2 years in
prison for second-degree manslaughter as a hate crime and
attempted robbery as a hate crime.
A fourth man,
Gary Timmons, had already pleaded guilty to attempted
robbery as a hate crime and testified in the case in
exchange for a four-year sentence.
Fortunato claimed
in court that the attack was not motivated by hate. But
prosecutors argued that under state hate-crimes law, they
didn't have to prove that Sandy's attackers hated gay
men -- only that they picked their victim because of
his sexual orientation. (AP)
