Two men claim they are the victims of an unprovoked hate crime that occurred over Folsom weekend in San Francisco.
Neil Frias and Jeff White were visiting from New York for the weekend when they say they were pepper sprayed by a gang of assailants simply for no reason other than they are gay.
Related: Behind The Harness: The Extraordinary History Of The Folsom Street Fair
“I’m trying to make sense of it,” Frias told the press on Sunday. “I would think what happened last night would happen somewhere else, not here.”
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The alleged attack happened around 9 p.m. last Saturday night outside a McDonald’s not far from where the festival was being held. Frais says he and White were leaving the restaurant when five guys pulled up in a blue minivan and shouted, “You fags are destroying family values!”
“I said I didn’t want any trouble, and one of them got out of the van,” Frais recalls. “I thought he was going to take a swing at me, but he sprayed me across the face.”
Related: Kick Off Folsom With These Awkward S&M Family Photos
A second man then jumped out and sprayed him again, while a third assailant went after White, who dropped to the ground and curled up in a ball to protect his face.
“I was completely vulnerable,” Frais, who became temporarily blinded, said. “I thought they were going to start beating me.”
It wasn’t until a woman nearby told the attackers she was calling the police that the mob got back into the minivan and sped off. Police and paramedics arrived shortly thereafter and the men returned safely to their hotel.
A spokesman for the San Francisco Police Department said they are currently looking for surveillance video that may have captured the incident.
“We take these crimes very seriously,” said Officer Carlos Manfredi. “If anybody feels they can attack someone based on their sexual preference, we’re going to go after them and hold them accountable.”
Related: PHOTOS: Lost Tourists Wander Into Folsom Street Fair & More From The Wild Weekend
As for Frais and White, they refused to let the incident prevent them from enjoying the rest of their weekend. By Sunday, they had recovered from the pepper spray and were geared up to hit the fair.
“I’m mad that I didn’t get to go out last night,” White said. “It’s Saturday night in San Francisco Folsom week!”
h/t: SFGate
Xzamilloh
Sooooooo… this is gonna sound messed up, but I think I’ll wait to believe this story.
ChrisK
Hmm…how hard would’ve it of been to get a license plate number? You better believe unless I was disabled that would’ve been my priority.
ChrisK
“White, who dropped to the ground and curled up in a ball to protect his face.”
Oh please whatever you do just don’t mess up my pretty face. Lol
Baba Booey Fafa Fooey
Descriptions of the assailants?
cdndmf
This is a terrible thing for these guys to have had happen to them, and I’m glad they’re ok. Have to say, though: “You fags are destroying family values,” sounds like a line Ryan Lochte might have come up with for his gay-bash-victim story.
ErikO
I doubt that this actually even really happened.
kittyconrad
How would anybody know you are gay?
joeyty
I’ll believe this story about as far as I could throw them.
stanhope
Doubters…may it happen to you. The police won’t do anything….they seldom do unless there’s a corpse.
Xzamilloh
@stanhope: Oh, fuck off. Nothing wrong with exercising skepticism and not believing a story at face value, especially after that little YouTube worm Calum McSwiggan faked a hate crime to hide the fact that he was a belligerent drunken hot mess at a club in WeHo. Why don’t we just wait for more info to come out?
joeyty
@stanhope: It DID happen to me. But with me it really happened.
Baba Booey Fafa Fooey
@Xzamilloh: This phrase seems a little weird:
“You fags are destroying family values!”
Who says that besides politicians. It just seems a little peculiar. And, no description of the assailants – unless they’re a particular race -and they’re protecting them – which is the “in” thing to do nowadays. Just things seems odd and are missing.
scotshot
They ate at a McDonald’s? Eek!
joeyty
@scotshot: (Hey ! Even the great Julia Child admitted she sometimes ate at McDonald’s and Burger King and considered them quite good for “what they were supposed to be”).
Xzamilloh
@Baba Booey Fafa Fooey: That immediately struck me as weird. And maybe they’re paraphrasing, but that’s an odd thing for a young group of attackers to say. Unless, they the local youth bible study let out late that night and they were looking to spread some good ole Christian love. Or maybe Islamic love. Or they were Amish. OR… maybe it has something to do with that particular McDonald’s being a hot spot for drug use. Who knows… it’s all speculation.
SFHandyman
@ChrisK: Have you ever been sprayed in the eyes with pepper spray? I have. And I couldn’t even tell the police what my muggers were wearing. All I could see is they were tall and thin. Otherwise, they were just blobs.
gayjim1969
@Baba Booey Fafa Fooey: “’You fags are destroying family values!’
Who says that besides politicians. It just seems a little peculiar.”
It’s clear that you haven’t been debating the current election on social media sites like I have. I have had this lobbed at me many times over the past year.
ChrisK
@SFHandyman: Frais was pepper sprayed but white wasn’t.
Tête Carrée
@Xzamilloh: That does sound messed up. By the way, well to the gay world! You’ve been here what now…24 hours?
Tête Carrée
@Xzamilloh: edit: WELCOME to the gay world!
Thank you Queerty, for the s**ty comments platform.
Tête Carrée
@ErikO: You must still be in the womb if you’re that innocent and naive.
Tête Carrée
@kittyconrad: Christ is this website only read by heterosexual troll nowadays?
joeyty
@ErikO: And everybody yells at you when you express healthy skepticism. The people who doubted Quinn Matney got yelled at. Same for those who doubted the supposed gaybashings by Charlie Rogers, Dayna Morales, Rick Jones of Delta Utah; Shawn Bennett; those two jerks in the NYC restaurant; Calum McSwiggan, on and on…
joeyty
@ErikO: ..oh yeah…how can I forget Pastor Jordan Brown…who wrote the homophobic message on the cake he bought ??
Tête Carrée
@Baba Booey Fafa Fooey: They probably gave the descriptions to the police. You need them for what? Think you live next door to them?
Tête Carrée
@joeyty:
“I’ll believe this story about as far as I could throw them.” Throw them? Damn, you are a homophobe!
“It DID happen to me. But with me it really happened.” After all that evidence you gave, why should we believe you? Like the “christians” say, “THE HOMOSEXUALS are allllll liars. They will even lie to cover up their gay lifestyle choice!” Wonder why. Duh. You know heterosexuals are all wonderful people with only our best interests at heart. Even if it means throwing them off rooftops out of “compassion” (get those 77 virgins in a hurry!)
Tête Carrée
@scotshot: I guess the Texas BBQ Grill and Sling was full.
joeyty
@Tête Carrée: I don’t care if you believe me or not. Aside from me, though, some gaybashing stories are true and others are made-up lies. Smart people know not to believe EVERY story they’re told.
joeyty
@Tête Carrée: I know all about Muslim homophobia. The Pulse massacre really happened, you know.
Tête Carrée
@cdndmf: Ryan Lochte is gay? WTF r u talking ’bout, Willis?
“You fags are destroying family values,” Who says that? 60% of politicians, 90% of “christians”, 99.9% of Muslims, 95% of the populations of Africa, Russia and several other countries, all the people who have spoken to, follow or worship the ground these people walk on.
They were 5 against 2. This is the typical modus operandi of fag bashers since the dawn of time. That’s the way they prove they are big men. Nobody said they were young. They were driving a MINIvan. How manly is that!
joeyty
@Tête Carrée: Nobody on the site this article was taken from (SFGate) believes the story either.
joeyty
Actually, the best line in the SFGate comments was, “They drove to a McDonald’s six miles away from their hotel ?? This story isn’t just fishy. It’s filet-o-fishy.”
Tête Carrée
@joeyty: I know. There are plenty of conspiracy theory /webpages out there though that are spitting on the young victims memories. Unlike the 9/11 and Sandy Hook conspiracy websites, there are no opposing opinions. Which is why I wouldn’t trust heterosexuals as far as my shotgun could blow them backwards.
joeyty
This is what happened, and I’ll apologize to all if it doesn’t turn out to be the case. The two guys learned they could score drugs at this particular McDonald’s (which is nothing but hoodlum gangsta types at night). There are many closer McDonald’s to where they were staying. They got attacked and robbed (as what happens when you’re buying drugs sometimes). They made up the homophobia comments. The SFPD will figure it out.
joeyty
@Tête Carrée: You’re right to be angry about homophobia and homophobic attacks. You just have to accept that some claims by gays (like with heterosexuals) turn out to be lies too.
Heywood Jablowme
I’m amused by the notion of going all the way to San Francisco to eat at McDonald’s. And they live in New York, yet. These two must go to New Orleans or Montreal and eat at Subway.
I prefer to destroy family values in higher style.
@joeyty: That actually makes sense.
@Tête Carrée: Nothing says “family values” like a minivan!
Baba Booey Fafa Fooey
@gayjim1969: Just seems a little articulate for gay bashers. Who knew gay bashers said things outside of “I’m gonna kill you, you f–king f–got!” But, who knows.
@Tête Carrée: Because I want the descriptions if they exist. If they do exist and they are omitted deliberately – that tells me everything I needs to know about the perps.
Baba Booey Fafa Fooey
@Tête Carrée: I agree with you about straights, Muslims, Christians, and blacks (you forgot them). As a gay person and a white gay person, they all want to turn me into soap. So, I steer clear of them. I want these guys to be telling the truth and I hope they are.
kevins48
as someone who writes for a living, you should be aware of your redundancy when you say “The alleged attack happened around 9 p.m. last Saturday night”.
abnerbha
When I read a gay (transexuals are mutilated gays/lesbians and they must abolish sex changes) bashing case in the news, I wonder what the view is of the journalist reporting this on homosexuality/lesbianism. I also wonder if the journalist is a homosexual or lesbian and if so, are they setting aside their bias and reporting the news with no problems. I do not trust news that I get from Daily Kos or the Huffington Post on their coverage of gay bashing cases because they predictably make the homosexual look like an innocent victim no matter what wrong the gay does.
Gay bashing victims will face the same public opinion court as gay bashers. If there are ugly truths about a homosexual which the media omits as they most media did with Methew Wayne Shepard, then we will use our free speech rights to tell the ugly truths about the homosexual even if others dislike it. & there is nothing any1 can do to legally stop us from telling the ugly truths. Gay bashing victims will face the public opinion court as gay bashers do and ugly truths will be told about a homosexual if it’s found though it offends.
Natrona County Juvenile Court gave Methew Wayne Shepard counseling for molesting 2 boys when he was 15 years old, but if the Wyoming legal system had given Methew Wayne Shepard years in prison rather than counseling by Natrona County Juvenile Court for molesting 8 year old boys when he was 15 years old, then Methew Wayne Shepard would have avoided being murdered in 1998.
ChrisK
@abnerbha: I liked you better when you wrote in retard language. The homophobic act is boring and no one reads it.
He BGB
There are alot of homophobes in the Bay Area, which is full of small towns, when you get out of the SF city. I lived in San Mateo for years and it was the opposite of San Francisco, conservative, Republican (Hillsborough was where Bing Crosby’s widow lived for instance, Hillsborough extreme conservatism). So these hateful thugs could have driven in from anywhere. I had people I worked with who hated, and I mean HATED! me and queers. I moved there from the East not knowing. After 6 years in San Mateo, moved to West Hollywood. Weeeee!
joeyty
@He BGB: These attackers were urban African-American though. (But I still don’t believe it was a homophobia-based assault).
Xzamilloh
@Tête Carrée: Who the fuck are you? (In my Coco Montrese voice) don’t try it, lil boy
jdboston617
It does read suspicious but this is easy to prove this story if the facts noted are correct. The article says there was a witness other than the two victims. Her statement is public record. Check it out. What did she see, if anything?
Where’s a journalist when you need one?
Juanjo
Sloppy editing here. The attack took place at 9 pm in the Fillmore, several miles from Folsom Street, specifically at Golden Gate and Fillmore Street. That is very close to the police station – only about a half block away.
ErikO
@Tête Carrée: The majority of Christians are not against LGBT people or our rights.