Hakim Scott and Keith Phoenix have pleaded not guilty to second degree murder as a hate crime and assault in the beating death of Jose Sukuzhanay (left) and his brother Ramel. Phoenix says he acted in self defense when Jose Sukuzhanay reached for a gun. The Sukuzhanay brothers were walking home from a bar after a party when Scott and Phoenix pulled up along side them in an SUV, and a fight ensued.
Scott smashed a beer bottle over Jose’s head and chased Romel with it, while Phoenix beat Jose “over and over again” with an aluminum bat, [prosecutor Josh] Hanshaft said, while the men shouted anti-gay and anti-Hispanic slurs.
Jose Sucuzhanay went into a coma and died several days later as his mother was en route from Ecuador to see him. He was buried in Ecuador.
…
The brothers were attacked because Phoenix “didn’t like what they looked like,” Hanshaft said. “He didn’t like that they were Hispanic. From his eye, it appeared they were a gay couple – a way of life he didn’t like and wasn’t going to tolerate.”
