Kentucky Gay bashing draws 15 years in prison

The gay basher is feeling that 15 years in prison for beating another man with a baseball bat is too severe? He should feel lucky the man didn’t die.

It’s scary how things can get out of control so easily. Kent and I went to Coventry Pizza a year or so ago. It’s actually kind of a hole in the wall, but the food is good, and it’s usually very friendly.

On this occasion, we sat at a booth. Directly across from us were two families. They were at tables that had been put together to accommodate their large numbers. The two men who were head of the two families, sat in chairs closest to our booth. I would say they were around 25-30 years old.

We ordered our food. I noticed that one of them kept looking over at us. I notice these things because when you’ve been harassed a lot and beaten up for being gay, you never let your guard down again. So, I was keeping an eye on them. All my senses were on alert.

Then it happened. I heard one of the men lean over to the other man and say to him, “I think we have a couple of fags sitting next to us.” I thought to myself, “Here we go again.”

But then something really cool happened. His friend who he told this to, the other man, looked at him with disgust and said, “I don’t believe you said that.” His friend looked at him as if he couldn’t believe that his friend, that he probably thought he knew so well, would end up defending a couple of “fags”. He said to his friend, “What the hell did I say?” His friend said back to him, “Just drop it now!”

That was a wonderful moment for me, because it really demonstrated to me that there are people, straight people, out there who will come to our defense and speak out against bigotry and hatred. And, you never know where you are going to find them.

Some of them, such as Jeff, post to this website. I honestly think that they are the most wonderful people in the world, because it’s easy to go with the flow of society and hate gays. It is. Everyone does it. But to be put to the test, when a friend of yours shows bigotry, and you stand up to him and risk your friendship for someone who is in a despised minority, that is courage.

Perhaps this man has a brother who is gay, or a sister who is lesbian. Maybe they were beaten or harassed. I don’t know. But somewhere along the way, he learned that bigotry and hate is evil.

And, if he hadn’t stood up to his friend’s bigotry, perhaps Kent and I would have experienced something similar to the story below.

A Newport man was sentenced to 15 years in prison Thursday for beating another man outside a gay-friendly bar in Newport -- but not before trying to withdraw his guilty pleas.

Campbell Circuit Judge Leonard Kopowski rejected Stephen Ard’s request to go back on his plea agreement, saying he had no legal basis to do so.

Ard, 38, previously pleaded guilty to charges of assault and endangerment. The charges said he attacked Matthew Ashcraft of Independence last June 26, following a dispute outside Woolly’s on Monmouth.

Prosecutors had reduced the charge of assault from first-degree to second-degree in exchange for Ard’s agreeing to a 15-year sentence. The terms of his guilty pleas allow him to be eligible for parole after serving 20 percent of his sentence, instead of the normal 85 percent for a violent crime.

But when his time for sentencing came Thursday, Ard asked to withdraw his plea. He said he felt pressured by circumstances to enter the pleas, and thought 15 years was too stiff a sentence for his crimes.

Witnesses say Ashcraft intervened as Ard and another man harassed Woolly’s customer Leon Hughes outside the bar. Ard and the other man fled the scene, but police said Ard returned with the baseball bat and struck Ashcraft several times.

Ashcraft is not gay, but he said he has several friends who are, and he was accompanying them to Woolly’s. He told The Post he had to step in when he saw Hughes being harassed outside the bar. (source)