Gay man with cerebral palsy attacked by "Modern Day KKK"

By Greg White
Staff Writer

Atlanta police are searching for two men who attacked a gay man with cerebral palsy, threw him from his wheelchair, and beat him up. Motivational speaker Christopher Coleman says his attackers kicked him while hurling racial and sexual slurs. 

According to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the men “came from behind him, pushed him out of his wheelchair and began to punch him in the chest several times causing visible bruising to the left side of his abdomen,” police said in the report. His shoes and jacket came off during the alleged attack.

“I heard two guys running up from behind me,” Coleman said in a report by WSB-TV in Atlanta.

He said he first thought it was some kind of joke, but then the  two men grabbed his wheelchair and steered it backward into a dark alley.

“They managed to grab me and pull me out of the wheelchair and began to kick me a couple of times, call me some really bad names,” he said. He says his attackers left behind a note laced with racial and anti-gay slurs and profanity. In it, they called themselves the “Modern Day KKK.”

Coleman told officers that he didn't get a good look at his attackers, but the voices of the two men sounded familiar. He was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital for treatment. He was released Saturday.

Coleman is an author and motivational speaker who preaches on equality and overcoming hardship. He's perplexed by the hatred that would drive such an attack.

"What happened in their lives that would make them want to do something like that?” he said. “I don’t live my life confined to my wheelchair. I don’t think people have to live their lives confined to theirs.”

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and WSB-TV Atlanta contributed to this report.

The Gayly- 4/22/2016 @ 4:09 PM CDT