Three teenage boys are facing criminal charges for beating a transgender teen at a party in Massachusetts.
Gloucester Police Department said that officers responded to reports of an attack in derelict woodland near Dogtown Road between Goose Cove and Babson Reservoir in Gloucester on August 30.
One teenager was taken to local hospital with injuries.
On Friday, Gloucester Police announced it was seeking assault and battery charges against three teenage boys, two aged 17 and one aged 16, in connection with the attack.
Police said that the incident began as “a party in the woods” and that all four males involved knew each another.
Neither the victim nor the suspects have been publicly named by police.
But the 16-year-old victim Jayden Tkaczyk has since spoken out and identified himself to local media.
Tkaczyk said he believes he was attacked because he is trans as he claimed his alleged attackers hurled anti-LGBTQ slurs at him, WCVB reported.
The teen said that roughly 20 to 30 people joined in the attack, violently beating, kicking, and stomping on him.
“One second, I was having fun, the next second, I was on the ground getting my face stomped and beat up,” the teen told NBC News.
“They were just saying the F slur over and over and over as they were punching me and stomping me.”
The teenager suffered a broken bone under his right eye, as well as multiple bruises and scratches across his body, reported the Associated Press.
He said he had been bullied at school for being transgender and was even forced off the Gloucester High School football team, according to AP.
Gloucester Police said it had been investigating the incident for the past three months and had placed a specially trained hate crime investigator on the case.
But, the evidence so far does not support the bringing of hate crime charges, police said.
The three suspects will now face a clerk magistrate hearing to determine whether there is probable cause for the charges to progress.
The Independent contacted Gloucester Police and the victim’s mother for comment.
