Teen sentenced for attacking gay couple – WRAL News

It makes me sad. That’s still today in 2022 that kids are still going through this kind of thing That anyone is going through anything like this and it hurts my heart and especially hurts my heart because it happened to my son, Stephanie Peacock son Christian was standing on his driveway hugging his boyfriend on July 30 when a teenager punched him in the face and yelled homophobic comments at the two. It was always been a very safe neighborhood and then to have something like this happened at your home where you’re supposed to feel safe. It just it really ride a lot of different emotions that you didn’t know that you had inside of you. The assault charges were enhanced by hate crime charges at Wednesday’s disposition. The judge reviewed recommendations from the state and the probation office to determine next steps in the case and deemed him to be a low risk to the community. I appreciate the good report from home detention. It’s an excellent report. So I am going to follow the recommendation from probation and terminate you from home detention and electronic monitoring. You’re still going to be on probation. The judge also ordered the minor to serve additional community service hours. Volunteering with L. G. B. T. Q. Groups taking an empathy class writing an apology letter to christian and paying restitution for material damages. All to help educate him about the consequences of your actions. That’s what we deal with a lot in here in the juvenile court is kids learning how to take responsibility for their actions and learning to think before they act outside the courthouse, a sea of pride flags. Community supporters gathered to show christian and his family that they are not alone. We have people that we don’t even know coming from California coming from, I mean just around the city, it’s just really nice to know that people are here from. My brother, christian’s parents say they hope a situation like this helps raise awareness so it doesn’t happen to anyone else. Be kind. You know, just like bottom line like be kind to others and you know, don’t punch someone because you don’t agree with who they are. You know that’s just not okay. And a simple message. I think it’s really important that we all keep standing up and saying, you know this is not okay. You know that we we you we are people everyone should be loved and accepted.