Stacey Barchenger

USA TODAY NETWORK – Tennessee

After the first time, the pain of the knife slicing into his thigh started to numb.

He did not know his attackers, only that four men who spoke English and another language he did not recognize forced him and his friend into a small sedan. A Saturn.

As the duo was driven to ATMs to withdraw cash in the Antioch area before sunrise in March 2012, they were repeatedly punched, stabbed and taunted. Laughed at. It lasted about 45 minutes.

They were forced to give each other oral sex. Forced to strip off their bloody clothes, told to get out of the car and pushed down on a road before their attackers fled.

After a week-long trial, a jury on Friday found one of the four attackers, Peterpal Tutlam, 31, guilty of six charges against him: two counts each of especially aggravated robbery, especially aggravated kidnapping and aggravated rape.

The verdict marks a step toward justice for the victims.

It does not mark the end of the impact from what one victim described as torture in the backseat of that car.

***

The two victims, both 24 at the time, had been friends since 8th grade. The Tennessean is not naming them because they are victims of rape.

In March 2012, one of the men was working two jobs, was engaged to be married and had a young daughter.

The girl gave him things, often a small pebble, to carry with him as a reminder of her.

The one in his pocket on March 17, 2012 ended up in a police evidence photograph.

The man and his friend were killing time early that day waiting for The Tennessean newspapers to be ready for delivery, which was the job of one of the men. They went to wait at one of their homes at Hickory Trace apartments on Hickory Hollow Place.

"These two young men were doing the right thing while the defendant and his family were plotting," Assistant District Attorney Megan King said during the closing arguments of Tutlam's trial on Thursday.

About three miles away, four men were leaving Caribbean Hut club on Antioch Pike. They’d spent hours drinking and dancing.

“I told my little brother I’m trying to rob someone tonight,” Duol Wal testified during trial on Thursday. Wal previously pleaded guilty in the attack.

Wal said he told his brother, who has also pleaded guilty, that his pockets were empty.

***

The victims were attacked outside of the apartment. One testified he was pushed up against a door and held there with a knife at his neck. He emptied a money clip and cellphone from his pockets, he said.

The victims were pushed into the backseat of the car, and Wal testified he held them there. The victims said they were beaten, stabbed in the arms and legs, threatened with death and told to keep their heads down. At one point, one of the men grabbed one victim's hand and tried to break his fingers.

"That was the moment it became about torture," the victim testified.

The attackers drove to at least two nearby ATMs to withdraw cash using the victims' debit cards. Wal said they got $1,600 from the cash machines. He testified in Tutlam's defense on Thursday, saying Tutlam was so drunk he did not participate in the attack.

But both victims said their attackers did not seem drunk and identified four men as being in the car.

"Everyone got their hits in," one victim testified. "There was no one who was not involved."

One victim said the attackers put a Sharpie marker that he could not see to his head and told him it was a gun. He said one of the attackers told him to give his friend oral sex or he would be killed. The victims testified that their attackers ordered his friend to do the same.

"They were kind of ridiculing us, making it seem like we wanted to be doing that," one victim testified.

According to the National Sexual Violence Resource Center, 1 in 71 men report having been raped compared to 1 in 5 women.

Sexual assault of men occurs less frequently than women, but experts say the emotional and psychological effects can be similar. Men may also have additional challenges because of stereotypes about masculinity, according to the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network.

The kidnappers drove to Franklin Limestone Road and told the victims to remove their clothing, according to testimony. One man said he was pushed into the gravel at the side of the road while the attackers shoved his friend to the pavement and began stomping on him, at least once on his head.

A scar curves above his eyebrow.

But all he remembers is a flash of light.

***

The men, naked and covered in blood, walked down a nearby street where they found a resident who called for help. Both suffered about 10 stab wounds. The man whose head was slammed on the pavement needed about 30 stitches for that injury alone and had a bruise on his brain, he testified.

Police tracked the four suspects using ATM video footage, tips from the suspects' family members and after the victims identified their attackers in photo lineups, among other tactics. Authorities found a knife with the victim's blood at Wal's house, King said.

All four men were charged in the attack.

Two of them, Duol Wal, 25, and Tut Tut, 19, previously pleaded guilty and are serving 30-year prison terms. The third, Yangreek Wal, 22, pleaded guilty in an agreement he would testify against Tutlam, and is awaiting sentencing.

King, who prosecuted Tutlam's case with Assistant District Attorney General Doug Thurman, said prosecutors will seek the longest possible sentence for Tutlam, up to 150 years according to Tennessee law, at a sentencing hearing set for Feb. 24.

"We're going to be asking for as much as we can get given the heinous nature of these crimes," she said Friday.

For the victims, the impact could last a lifetime. One victim testified that he suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety because of the attack.

The other said he had nightmares for months afterward and struggled with substance abuse. He said the incident ended his relationship with his fiancée.

"Psychologically it's been hell, honestly," he said. "It pretty much tore my family apart."

Reach Stacey Barchenger at 615-726-8968 or on Twitter @sbarchenger.

Interpreters

Peterpal Tutlam is from South Sudan and has been in the U.S. as a refugee since he was about 10 years old, according to his attorney, David Harris. All four men charged in the case were born abroad but have lived in the U.S. much of their lives.

Two Nuer interpreters from Minnesota attended but were rarely used in Tutlam's five-day trial. Tutlam and the other defendants - two of whom testified during Tutlam's trial - speak the African language as well as English.

Tutlam's attorney said Judge Cheryl Blackburn used the interpreters in an abundance of caution because of another recent case involving a refugee whose convictions were overturned because of an issue with her language.