NBC Poducer And Friend Victims Of 'Gay Bashing’

PHILIPSBURG, ST. MAARTEN - Senior NBC Nightly News producer Richard Jefferson, who was vacationing in St. Maarten, was one of two men rushed to St. Maarten Medical Center around 3:30am Thursday after they suffered a severe beating by a group of men who the victims say were “gay bashers.”
While Jefferson was able to walk, he sustained severe cuts on the back of his head and his lower back.
The second victim Ryan Smith, was less fortunate. He had a fractured skull and has been unable to speak properly since the incident.
The men, who were reportedly beaten with a wheel wrench, expressed concern that the police here did not seem to be too concerned about crimes of this nature. They said the police’s failure to even contact them following the attack made it seem as though they sanctioned the “brutal beating.”
Smith was in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) until late Thursday and was expected to be flown out to Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami along with Jefferson.
Jefferson told The Daily Herald he found the incident sad, as it had made it difficult at best for him to call an island he has been visiting for more than 15 years “a friendly island anymore.” He said the violent attack on him and his friend had been an expression of hatred for gay men by the suspects and made him very concerned about being on the island any more.
He said, “St. Maarten is one of the only two places in the Caribbean where you could say had a gay beach, in Cupecoy, and we have never been harassed before and have always been able to be ourselves.”
According to other friends of Jefferson who witnessed the beating, the incident stemmed from earlier harassment by the suspects while they were all gathered at Bamboo Bernie’s Wednesday night. Apparently the hate words grew to such an extent that management offered to have Smith wait until it was possible for him to be escorted from the club to avoid his being attacked.
“They took up a chair at one stage and tried to hit us with it,” said one of Jefferson’s friends. Jefferson said he had not been involved in that incident, as he had been on his way to meet with the others.
They left some time early Thursday morning and were walking past Sunset Beach Bar towards their hotel when the suspects, a group of about four men and two women, drove their car past them, almost hitting Smith.
Jefferson who was walking in the distance, came close to his friend when the car stopped and the suspects got out and started beating Smith. Jefferson said, “I only remember asking what was going on and I was knocked out.” He said a man with thick lock-like hair had had a pipe wrench with which he beat both Smith and Jefferson.
Jefferson said he had learnt that many people, including management at Sunset Beach Bar, a nearby casino and Bamboo Bernie’s, had called the police, but no one showed up. He said he had called the police station on Thursday around 1:00pm and had spoken to a detective, but no one showed up at the hospital or called.
He asked what form of justice this was and whether their treatment would have been the same had one of them been killed at the hands of the attackers
from The Daily Herald