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Homeless fend off attack, deputies say

A man believed to be an attacker is in critical condition. Two others are charged with assault.

By BEN MONTGOMERY AND S.I. ROSENBAUM Times Staff Writers
Published December 30, 2006

GIBSONTON - Blood spilled on the railroad tracks behind the Showtown lounge, and on Mottie Road, and on the rocks beside the woods where the homeless men sleep at night.

"The knife was over here," said a man they call Johnny Rotten, pointing toward a ditch. "That must've been some fight."

It all started, according to sheriff's deputies, when two teens and a 24-year-old man with a criminal record started throwing rocks at two homeless men walking along the railroad tracks before sunrise Friday morning.

When the homeless men fell, the three attackers moved in to beat and kick them, deputies said.

That's when one of the transients, Jeffrey Price, 31, pulled a knife from his pocket and started swinging.

He struck Gabriel Greer, 16, in the face and stabbed Travis Riley, 24, in the torso multiple times.

The attackers fled. The homeless men escaped with minor injuries.

Sheriff's deputies were quick to take everyone except Greer into custody. Greer was flown to Tampa General Hospital, where he was in critical condition Friday evening.

Before Friday ended, the homeless men - Price and 30-year-old Kenneth Wilson - had been questioned and released. The men accused of the attack - Greer, Riley and 17-year-old Richard Morse Jr. - had been arrested and charged with aggravated assault and battery.

Several locals said vengeance was a long time coming.

The homeless who live in a strip of woods between the railroad tracks and U.S. 41 are robbed regularly of the daily pay they earn working for nearby Able Body Labor, they said.

"I look at it this way," said Billy McGribb, who woke Friday morning to police lights, "I'm glad they got them. It's a hell of a thing to say, but it's about time. They've had it coming."

Johnny Rotten, a carnival worker who wouldn't give his real last name, said he was robbed in May. He escorted a lady friend into the woods and a man jumped out, roughed him up and stole $50 from his pants pocket.

"They eyeball them there at Able Body," he said. "As soon as they get a chance, here they come."

The attack Friday morning appeared to have been planned, sheriff's spokesman J.D. Callaway said.

But Morse's cousins told a different story.

Brothers Mark and Bryan Desautels said their cousin, Morse, and his friends were the victims and that the transients were the attackers.

The boys were walking with the group along the railroad tracks on their way to a friend's house after a night of drinking, said Mark, 16. Suddenly, they heard rustling in the bushes.

The transients appeared, and Mark said he heard one say to the other, "Look who it is, Jeffro," and then, "Are you the guys who jumped my boy?"

The men started shining flashlights in the faces of Mark's group, he said.

"You can't see it coming, can you?" one of the men said, according to Mark and Bryan.

The older men told the brothers to stay back while they tried to get the flashlights from the transients, Mark and Bryan said.

Greer then threw rocks at the men to try to break the bulb out of the flashlight, the boys said. Riley tried to kick them and missed, and that's when he got stabbed, Mark said, adding that he didn't realize the extent of Riley's injuries until much later.

The Sheriff's Office couldn't confirm the boys' story.

"I don't have information on that," Callaway said. "But we're confident in the probable cause for those charges."

The boys did acknowledge their cousin's criminal record, which includes charges of burglary, larceny, vehicle theft, grand theft auto and battery.

Riley, whose nickname is Pac Man, also has an arrest history that includes grand theft auto, possession of marijuana with intent to sell and resisting arrest. He was released from prison in August after serving more than a year for drug and bomb threat convictions.

The attack exemplifies a growing concern for Rayme Nuckles, chief executive of the Homeless Coalition of Hillsborough County.

"It isn't something that's simply isolated," he said. "There are statistics tracked all across the country, and it seems as if homeless beatings and these kind of incidents are on the rise."

In Fort Lauderdale in January, police charged three teens with homicide in the beating death of Norris Gaynor, a homeless man.

And four teenagers in Broward County faced attempted murder charges in October for allegedly beating and stabbing a homeless man.

"We've lost a sense of our moral obligations to assist those who need help from us," Nuckles said.

Reporters Helen Anne Travis and Saundra Amrhein and Times Researcher John Martin contributed to this report. Ben Montgomery can be reached at bmontgomery@sptimes.com or 813 661-2443.

[Last modified December 30, 2006, 06:10:12]