Disabled Man Sexually Assaulted At Point Defiance Park, Police Say

http://www.kirotv.com/news/22676488/detail.html

Posted: 5:28 pm PST February 25, 2010Updated: 7:53 am PST February 26, 2010

TACOMA, Wash. -- Police are looking for the person who sexually assaulted a developmentally disabled man at Point Defiance Park Saturday afternoon.

Tacoma police said the 24-year-old victim was fishing on the dock at the park before the attack. He was then enticed into the men’s bathroom at the boathouse by an older man. Once inside, police said the man sexually assaulted the victim.

Eyewitnesses said they saw the man walk away at about 1:30 p.m., but he got away before police were notified.

The attacker is described as African-American, about 35 to 40 years old, around 5 feet 10 inches tall and slender. Eyewitnesses said his clothes were distinctive: a black baseball hat, a bright-blue T-shirt and green camouflage pants with jeans underneath.

Anyone with information should call Crime Stoppers of Tacoma and Pierce county at 253-591-5959.

Tips can also be submitted confidentially to the Tacoma Police Department through this Web site: here.

Disabled Myrtle Beach woman attacked by strangers in home

http://www2.counton2.com/cbd/news/state_regional/article/disabled_myrtle_beach_woman_attacked_by_strangers_in_home/115077/

Holly Snead says two men broke into her home in Myrtle Beach, beat her up, and stole her prescription medication.

Carer jailed for trampoline attack in County Durham

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/wear/8518601.stm

A former soldier who attacked a severely disabled man as they exercised on a trampoline at a County Durham care home has been jailed for eight months.

Carer Wayne Parker, 37, shoved Gareth Gunner, 22, into safety netting before striking him with karate-style blows at the Newbus Grange home in Neesham.

Teesside Crown Court heard a neighbour filmed the attack after hearing Mr Gunner's screams in August last year.

Parker was jailed after pleading guilty to assaulting a person in his care.

Prosecutor Jenny Haigh said neighbour Stephen Gray grabbed his camera after watching Parker, of Harcourt Street, Darlington, taunting and laughing at his victim, who has a vocabulary of just a few words.

'Fear and distress'

He then recorded Parker pushing Mr Gunner with great force into the safety netting surrounding the trampoline and punching him in the face.

Another witness, Clare Mathieson, described hearing Parker's "cruel, nasty" laughter and Mr Gunner wailing unhappily as he was attacked.

Judge Tony Briggs, who watched the recording of the attack, said: "It is perfectly plain that Mr Gunner was clearly distressed and frightened, and in relation to that it is not a surprise that those who lived nearby and were used to the sounds patients made clearly stated that they were sounds of fear and distress.

Sections Latest NewsScotland- North East- Edinburgh, East and Fife- Glasgow and West- Tayside and Central - Inverness and Highlands- South UKIntern

http://news.scotsman.com/edinburgh/Im-scared-to-go-out.6067507.jp

Published Date: 12 February 2010

By ALAN McEWEN

A THUG punched and head- butted a disabled man on a busy city bus after the victim shouted back when he taunted him.

Ex-convict Ian Brown left father-of-one Steven Davidson battered and bloodied after chasing after the bus on which he was travelling to attack him.

Mr Davidson's partner Susan Wright said today that Brown – who was previously jailed for assault and robbery – had picked on him for years after singling him out "because of his learning difficulties". The couple called for him to be jailed.

Mr Davidson, 42, was heading to a training session with his special needs football team when he was attacked on the number 26 bus on Portobello High Street.

He said: "I was on the bus and Ian Brown was coming out of a shop with a paper. He started shouting at me and calling me names. I shouted back, "I'm not, you are".

"Then he got into his car and drove after the bus to the next stop. He came up to me and said, "What did you say?", then he head-butted me in the face. My nose was bleeding then he started punching me too. I knew I couldn't do anything so I waited for him to stop."

‘Friends’ torture, kill disabled woman

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35370263/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/

GREENSBURG, Pa. - Jennifer Daugherty's mom and stepdad didn't press for details when she mentioned she had made some new friends. The 30-year-old had the mental abilities of an adolescent but wasn't the kind to get in trouble, and she was even thinking about getting her own place soon. Police found her body Friday stuffed into a garbage can in a school parking lot; they say she had been forced to consume detergent and urine — and to write a fake suicide note — before she was fatally stabbed by attackers who also shaved her head and painted her face with nail polish. Six suspects have been charged, including her new "friends."
"She was exploited, and her kindness and her handicap made her very vulnerable," Daugherty's sister, Joy Burkholder, said. "She trusted everybody; she believed everyone was good, and no one would hurt her."



Daugherty's stepfather said she often traveled on her own by bus from her home in Mount Pleasant to Greensburg, about 10 miles away, for dental or counseling appointments. After she hopped onto a bus Monday, she called her folks later in the day seeking permission to spend the night at "Peggy's" house.
It was the last time she would talk to them.
Daugherty went willingly went to the apartment where she was killed about 30 miles east of Pittsburgh, according to police, who wouldn't discuss a motive or details on how the visit turned deadly.



Wrong place at wrong time?
Police say she was beaten with a towel rack, vacuum cleaner hose and a crutch, and her body bound with Christmas decorations, an affidavit said. Police said she was fed vegetable oil, medications and spices in addition to soap and urine.
She was stabbed multiple times with an unknown weapon in the neck, chest and head, Westmoreland County Coroner Kenneth Bacha said. Authorities said they found the victim's belongings in the building's attic, as well as items that had been used to clean up blood.
"She was at the wrong place, at the wrong time, stumbled into a bad situation," said Greensburg Police Chief Walter Lyons.