Mar 10, 2006  |  By: DYANA BAGBY  | COMMENTS     

ATLANTA—Five soldiers from Fort Stewart in Georgia remained jailed March 8 after being charged with aggravated battery for allegedly beating a man in front of a Savannah gay bar over the weekend.

David Bennett, 37, was allegedly beaten by the soldiers at about 3:15 a.m. on March 5, according to a report filed by the Savannah-Chatham Metropolitan Police Department. One of the soldiers, Sidney Swift, "spontaneously stated, ‘Yes, I beat that mother-fucking faggot up. I was buying him drinks all night,’" the police report said.

The other soldiers arrested are Clinton Little, Derrick Fritz, Rocco Sorma and Adam Pittman. They were denied bond.

The soldiers are members of the Army’s Third Infantry Division based at Fort Stewart, Ga., and had just recently returned from a tour of duty in Iraq, according to a Savannah police spokesperson.

Calls to the public affairs office at Fort Steward were not returned.

The Savannah Morning News reported March 6 that Bennett was leaving Blaine’s Back Door Bar, a gay bar, when the soldiers attacked him.

But Lt. Mike Wilkins, spokesperson for the police department, said the incident started at a nearby bar, McDonough’s Restaurant & Lounge, and Bennett was chased to Blaine’s, where he had been earlier in the evening. McDonough’s is not a gay bar.

Gay activists have already cited Bennett’s beating as one more reason why Georgia needs a hate crimes law, but Savannah police said they are unsure the crime was committed because of Bennett’s sexual orientation.

"I think there is the inference a gay man was beaten, but right now there is no indication [Bennett] was gay," Wilkins said March 7. "The encounter didn’t start at the gay bar. And we can’t confirm the assault occurred simply because [Bennett] was gay."

Victim missing

Police have been unable to locate Bennett to proceed with the investigation and there are reports he is homeless, Wilkins said. Bennett also faces four felony warrants for parole violations in Florida, Wilkins said, but he could not identify the violations.

Without Bennett, prosecutors are unlikely to proceed with the cases, Wilkins added.

"Bennett checked out of the hospital against medical advice [after receiving treatment in the early hours of March 5] and we have not been able to locate him," Wilkins said. "If the victim never comes forward — well, you have to have a victim to prosecute. If you don’t have a victim, then you can’t proceed."

Allen Craighead, a bartender at Blaine’s, said that Bennett is openly bisexual and frequently visits the gay bar.

Bennett was asked to leave Blaine’s at about midnight on March 4 because he was becoming a nuisance to other customers by "hitting them up for drinks," said Craighead, who was working that night.

When Craighead was taking out the trash at about 3 a.m. on March 5, he said he saw Bennett running around the corner with five men chasing him. Craighead said he immediately rushed inside the bar, shut the door and called 911.

After the call, Craighead said he opened the door and found Bennett lying on the sidewalk bleeding and wounded badly.

"You could tell he took a fist to the right eye," Craighead said.

The police report states Bennett was hit and kicked and was "bleeding profusely from lacerations along his right side, a cut near or on the right eye. He was barely conscious."

Joey Holliday, a bartender at McDonough’s, said the five soldiers who were arrested were very drunk and disruptive, and they were asked to leave.

The Savannah police report states all the soldiers were "very intoxicated and had a extreme odor of alcoholic beverages coming from them."

Hate bill advances

Meanwhile, a bipartisan Georgia state Senate committee voted 8-3 on Tuesday, March 7, in favor of a hate crimes bill that would increase penalties for crimes motivated by a variety of categories, including sexual orientation.

Sponsored by state Sen. Vincent Fort (D-Atlanta), Senate Bill 347 was introduced in response to a 2004 decision by the Georgia Supreme Court that overturned the state’s existing four-year-old hate crime law, which outlawed crimes based on "bias or prejudice" but did not specify the categories protected.