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The GW Hatchet

Serving the GW Community since 1904

The GW Hatchet

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Officials name senior vice president, chief of staff
By Fiona Riley, Assistant News Editor • March 26, 2024

MPD reports ‘suspected hate crime’ between students

This post was written by Hatchet reporter Liz Provencher.

A student was assaulted early morning Saturday in what a Metropolitan Police Department document called a “suspected hate crime.”

According to a MPD document, a man walking with another person at around midnight on Sept. 12 was assaulted after being approached by six men, who yelled “homophobic slurs” in front of the Nine Twenty-Five Apartments on 25th Street. The men made statements like “you guys are faggots and queers,” according to the document.

Following the statements, one of the men proceeded to “punch the student with closed fists to the head.” The student then fell to the ground but a witness helped the student to his feet. Upon standing back up, the man continued to punch the student in the head until the student fell back to the ground.

“After the student fell to the ground once again, the six suspects fled in an unknown black vehicle in a northbound direction,” the incident report reads.

The document said four officers responded to the incident early Saturday morning.

University spokesman Kurtis Hiatt said the incident is listed in GW’s crime log as a simple assault. He said in an email that MPD contacted the University Police Department “for assistance to identify the individuals involved.”

The crime log states that case is now closed and at least one student was referred to GW’s Office of Student Rights and Responsibilities. The crime log also identifies the assailant and two victims as students.

Patrick Kennedy, the chair of a local Foggy Bottom neighborhood group, said in an interview that a MPD spokesman described the assault at the group’s meeting last week, saying that the incident involved members of two unknown GW fraternities.

“It is my understanding that the students involved were from two different GW fraternities,” Kennedy said.

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