Police arrested a teen after he assaulted a gay rights activist in Hell’s Kitchen, authorities said.
Eugene Lovendusky, 28, said he was leaving a club on 42nd Street near 8th Avenue with his boyfriend and a friend about 3:20 a.m. when they were approached by a group of teenagers.
“They were yelling f—-t,” he said, and added that his first reaction was to stand up for himself. “I said you can’t call me that.”
Manuel Riquelme, 19, of East Harlem allegedly punched him in the right side of his jaw, knocking the glasses off his face.
When his friend stepped in to help him, Lovendusky said that one assailant asked, “Do you want to be next, f—-t?”
He called 911, and said that police arrived quickly. They canvassed the area, and quickly spotted Riquelme and the other teens at a pizzeria on 40th and 9th Avenue.
Police busted Riquelme at the pizzeria, and charged him with assault as a hate crime, as well as harassment.
He was arraigned on a charge of second-degree aggravated harassment, and no bail was set.
The assault comes in the wake of a spike in anti-gay violence this year, including the murder of Mark Carson, 32, in Greenwich Village on May 18.
Speaker Christine Quinn denounced the latest attack this afternoon.
“I thought most of the really horrible days of hate crimes were behind us,” she said. “I had a conversation with [Commissioner] Kelly last week requesting more police resources for the West Side, and it’s the exact same conversation I had in the 1900s with the first deputy police commissioner.”
Lovendusky is a gay rights activist who has been active this month in protesting these bias attacks, and founded the grassroots group Queers Rising.
“It’s further proof that anyone no matter how strong or vocal you are in the community can be a victim,” he told the Post. “If anything this will only strengthen my resolve.”
He said he hopes that Quinn will allocate resources for self defense classes for the gay community, and that bar and night club owners increase their security.
Quinn was enthusiastic about the idea.
“This is kind of strength that these survivors have,” she said. “They think they’re going to cause fear so profound that people will be terrified back into the closet. They don’t know that the fear they try to engender is met with deeper and bigger strength.”