NBC News reported that on Oct. 15, a violent and physical assault occurred in an apartment complex off-campus of Salisbury University. Police were initially contacted on Oct. 31, 16 days after the assault occurred. When police arrived, witnesses showed them videos of the assault occurring that “allegedly showed ‘an adult male victim being assaulted by several college-aged men,’” police said in a news release on Nov. 7.
Police had met with the victim later on and had been informed that the group of men had used a fake instagram account to lure the victim to the apartment complex. Police reported that when the victim had entered the residence in question, several college-aged men allegedly surrounded the victim and forced him to sit in a chair isolated in the middle of the room. The victim then describes being ‘kicked, punched and spit on while the men called the victim derogatory names.’ The victim also reported several attempts to leave the residence, but was unsuccessful, as the men shoved him to the ground. After several minutes of this assault, the men left the victim in need of medical attention, with several bruises and a broken rib. It was later concluded that the victim was targeted due to his sexual orientation.
As of Nov.16, the police have arrested 12 Salisbury students, several of which are brothers of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity. As a result of their arrests for hate crimes, they were all later suspended from the university. They were charged with first-degree assault, reckless endangerment, false imprisonment and hate crime offenses, all of which are the “harshest penalty the University is able to implement at this stage of the process.”
More updates are expected to come later on.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna180462
