Georgia College Student Assaulted in Possible Hate Crime

Two Georgia men are accused of beating a Kennesaw State University student earlier this week in an attack that may bring hate crime charges.

Gauge Dakota Stanley and Kole Zuba Reasoner, both 20, have been charged with felony aggravated battery and misdemeanor battery in an alleged attack on Jalique Rosemond Sunday night at his apartment complex about two miles north of the KSU campus.

Rosemond told police the two white men attacked him as he was getting out of his car, knocked him to the ground, and kicked him in the face while calling him the N-word. Rosemond’s roommate, Emmanuel Osakwe, told WAGA that the assailants “pulled out his dreadlocks.”

“They just pounced on him, hitting him, abusing him,” Osakwe said. “They did kick him in the nose, and his nose was fractured.”

“Based on the statements of the victim, this ultimately could be racially motivated,” Kennesaw Police said. “A peace officer cannot charge for a hate crime. It is a sentencing enhancement brought on during the prosecution of the case.”

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Surveillance video captured part of the attack.

“They were hitting me, they stomped on me,” Rosemond told WXIA later in the week. “As they’re beating me they’re referring to me as Black boy, boy, (N-word), constantly saying racial slurs as they’re attacking me.”

Rosemond, a sophomore studying business, said he didn’t know the two men. He said he arrived home after working his job as a Door Dash driver, saw some men standing in the parking lot, and drove around them to park. Two men were reportedly sitting in a Jeep Wrangler while Reasoner and Stanley attacked Rosemond. The two men jumped into the Wrangler and drove off before police arrived.

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[Featured image: WXIA screenshot]