Homeless man beaten to death by 3 teenagers

There has been an increase in attacks on the homeless in the past year in Cleveland.

CLEVELAND (AP) — A man beaten to death by teenagers on the sidewalk of a busy street as motorists watched is the latest in a series of attacks against the homeless on the city’s east side.

The three teens who beat Anthony Waters, 42, remained at large Friday, police said. Waters suffered a lacerated spleen and broken ribs during the attack Wednesday night and died at a hospital. Some of the attack was caught on videotape.

Young people have been preying on the homeless, and attacks against them in Cleveland have increased from one in 2006 to 10 last year, said Brian Davis, director of the Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless.

“There seem to be young people who view homeless people as targets,” Davis said. “Homeless do carry all of their belongings. They don’t have a lot of money, but they usually have everything they own on them.”

Although robbery was the motive in the attack against Waters, police don’t believe he was targeted because he was homeless, police spokesman Lt. Thomas Stacho said.

Waters was taking a route through an industrial area Wednesday night that he usually used to avoid people who taunted him as he walked from a homeless shelter to his mother’s house.

The attackers, who appeared to be around 14 to 17, took a music player and headphones from Waters, police said. They wore white T-shirts and one rode a silver BMX bicycle.

Passing motorists on East 55th Street saw the attack but did not stop. One female driver flagged down a squad car and was first to notify police about the crime, Stacho said.

Portions of the attack were caught on a surveillance camera outside G M Towing Company. The videotape, which was not released, shows passing cars slowing to watch three teens attack Waters until he staggered into the parking lot, where he was assisted by G M employees, police said.

Waters initially told the employees he didn’t need an ambulance, according to a 911 call. He died less than three hours later.

“I think everybody’s a little disturbed over what occurred,” Craig Collins, general manager at the towing company, said Friday.

One of the employees chased after the teens and provided police with a solid description, Stacho said.

“It’s almost heroic what these guys did,” he said. “They didn’t know if these kids were armed.”

In April, a group punched a 55-year-old homeless man in the head, then used a board with nails to hit his legs, leaving dime-sized holes. They took $10 from him.

The city’s homeless community has been encouraged to travel in groups and avoid an area a few blocks from an east-side homeless shelter where a number of attacks have occurred, Davis said.

The attack on Waters also was the second unprovoked attack in a week in the area. The crime happened five days after a man was shot in the stomach and critically injured while pumping gas. No arrest has been made in the shooting of 49-year-old Fazliddin Yakubov, which was recorded by a gas station surveillance camera and was unrelated to Waters’ death.

A rally was planned Friday night by Council for American-Islamic Relations to show support for Yakubov and his family and to express outrage over the shooting.

Both crimes occurred in an area of Cleveland between downtown and the city’s University Circle district, home to notable institutions like the Cleveland Museum of Art, Case Western Reserve University, University Hospitals and the Cleveland Clinic.

None of the passing cars that slowed down to watch the attack on Waters stopped, said Cleveland Police Lt. Thomas Stacho.

“The pack mentality going on in the city of Cleveland must end,” Third District Police Commander Calvin Williams said at a news conference where he urged the attackers to come forward. “The mayor told us to take the gloves off.”

Waters was a welder by trade but had been staying at a Cleveland-area homeless shelter, said his friend, Paul Eadeh, who occasionally gave him work at a beverage store.

Officials from the shelter are working with Waters’ family to plan a memorial service, Davis said.

“And it was just horrifying the way he looked,” Marlo Massey, Waters’ sister, told WKYC-TV. She viewed her brother’s body after the attack. “They beat him to death and I just can’t stop thinking what was on his mind while it was happening.”