Walking alone to a friend’s house after a party around 3 a.m. on November 22, Sheperd Smith ’04 was approached and assaulted by a group of four unidentified teenage men on the corner on High Street near Huber Avenue.
Because of a homophobic remark made by the attackers, the event was described as a hate crime even though Smith doubts that that was his assailants’ motivation.
Between five to seven men and two women around 19 years old called Smith a “faggot” as he crossed through the Butterfield parking lot near Lawn Avenue. Smith said he had never seen them before and yelled back as he continued to walk past them. He was followed by about four men as he walked north on High Street.
Smith said he saw one of the men follow him, but thought that he would stop when because there were two Public Safety cars in a parking lot behind the day care center.
Smith was hit on the back of the head as he crossed Huber Avenue by about four men who knocked him down against the wall of the day care center and repeatedly kicked him in the head as Smith tried to cover himself with his hands.
He said that after he had yelled about five times, the men kicked him once more before running away. Smith said he then went to the Public Safety cars he had seen earlier to ask them to catch his assailants.
“I think they were sort of shocked to see me walk up with blood,” Smith said, explaining that his hands were bleeding from trying to shield his head. “I think that’s why they didn’t get them.”
Public Safety called for an ambulance and Smith was treated for his injuries, which included bruises to the head. Smith said he declined further medical treatment because at the time he did not feel it was necessary.
The Middletown Police questioned Smith and then escorted him to a location near the Psi-U fraternity house where Smith said he was unable to identify his attackers from a group of non-University individuals.
“I’m almost certain they were from the same group, but not the ones who followed me,” Smith said, indicating that they may have been with his attackers when he first passed them in the Butterfield parking lot.
According to a recent security alert from Director of Public Safety Maryann Wiggin, the group has been banned from campus. Smith said that he had heard that the group had been asked to leave Asian/Asian-American House for stealing and had been seen stealing earlier that evening at Malcolm X House. The Public Safety report also mentioned that the individual attackers were linked to thefts that night.
Smith said that it was after being asked to identify the attackers that he realized his ear was particularly swollen so the police escorted him back to Middlesex Hospital for treatment. Smith said he waited there until seven in the morning to receive a CAT scan that confirmed he was fine. He said both friends and Public Safety came to the hospital to see him.
Smith said he has since been asked by the police look at pictures to help identify the attackers, but was unable to do so. He did describe the attackers as African-American and about nineteen years old and said that one had a long face and was about six feet tall. He also said that he thought Public Safety and the police were working independently of one another as each seemed to have different information about the incident.
In recent emails to the University community, President Doug Bennet and Wesleyan Student Assembly (WSA) President Sohana Punithakumar ’04 characterized the event as a hate crime.
“The recent onslaught of homophobic and racially charged assaults on campus is unacceptable,” Punithakumar wrote in her email.
Smith, who is not homosexual, said he did not believe he was assaulted for homophobic reasons. He said he thought that his attackers, having recently been caught stealing at a party at AAA House, were looking to beat someone.
“I don’t feel singled out. It was just the wrong place at the wrong time,” he said. “I think had it been anyone, they would have come after them. [The homophobic remark] was like a footnote in my report to Public Safety,” he said. “I don’t think that was the motivation for attacking me.”
He added that he did meet with students from the queer community and said he understands their concern about the assault regardless of what was meant by the remark.
Smith said his injuries were not too serious and that he is ready to move past the assault.
“Nothing was that serious. It looked pretty gruesome for a couple of days, but it healed really fast,” he said.
Smith did express concern about what he said was a particularly high level of crime on campus this year. He mentioned incidents of theft and violence that had happened to friends and the recent laptop thefts from student residences.
“This is my fourth year here and there have never been this many reports of problems, in my memory anyway,” he said.
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