A Charlotte woman has reported to police that she was attacked on Saturday night while in uptown by assailants who hurled anti-gay slurs at her.
The Charlotte Observer reports that two 17 year old girls were arrested on misdemeanor assault charges and the Charlotte Mecklenburg Police Department has asked the FBI whether they could be charged under federal hate crime laws.
From the article:
The woman who reported the attack said that she is accustomed to verbal attacks because she is gay. Since the passage of North Carolina’s House Bill 2, she said such inflammatory remarks have intensified. It’s almost, she said, as if the new law – which nullified Charlotte’s anti-discrimination ordinance – gave people permission to be hateful.
But until Saturday, she said she had never before been physically assaulted.
She agreed to talk because “if I don’t, it’s just going to keep happening.” She said she is still so shaken, she spoke to the Observer only on the condition that she not be identified.
The woman, who works as a chef, was leaving work with a friend and reports being asked by the girls if she was a “stud” before being called a “faggot” and a “queer.”
The woman says she ignored the girls but they followed her, along with some of their friends, and then attacked. She reports being hit in the face, thrown to the ground and kicked in the ribs.
The girls, Thomasena Michelle Chisolm and Kiara Marie Johnson, were charged with misdemeanor assault and were released to the custody of family members on Tuesday.