The city and community Thursday reacted after two gay men became victims of a possible hate crime.
Last weekend, the two men say they were walking back to their cars around 2:30 a.m. from a gay bar on 4th street after having a night-out with their gay softball team. They noticed four men following them.
When the two approached the parking garage on the east side of Austin City Hall, the four young men attacked.
"At one point there were three guys on me, punching, hitting me in the head -- hence the bruising and cuts on my face," said Emmanuel Winston.
"Then when they turned around and said 'faggot,' it hit me like a ton of bricks, and I was like, 'Wow! I was just involved in a hate crime,'" said Matthew Morgan.
"I want to make this a call to action," said City Councilmember Laura Morrison. Both she and Councilmember Randi Shade joined Equality Texas at a news conference Thursday afternoon to take a stand against violence.
"We're here today because we as a community will not stand for biased-motivated crime," said Equality Texas Interim President Chuck Smith.
"As an openly gay member of Austin City Council, I, of course take this very seriously," Shade said.
According to Department of Justice statistics, in 2008 Texas saw 246 hate crime attacks. Fifty-five of those were directly related to sexual orientation. Of those 55, seven happened in Austin.
Smith says, "There have been recent studies that have shown somewhat of an increase in biased-crimes in Austin and Travis County."
Police are still searching for the four men. The investigation into the incident will continue. After the investigation is over, the case could be turned over to the District Attorney's Office for investigation as a hate crime.
