Email Share 52 Shares

A gay tourist from Atlanta was attacked early Saturday morning during a Bahamian festival.

Alexus D’Marco, president of Bahamas Transgender Intersex United, told the Washington Blade in an email that Adrian Brown, who is in the U.S. Navy, “was attacked and beaten with bottles and rocks” during the Bahamas Junkanoo Festival in Nassau, the Bahamian capital.

D’Marco said the altercation began when Brown confronted the two men after they threw water at him.

“They replied because you’re a sissy batty man dancing up,” D’Marco told the Blade. “They began to hit the tourist with bottles and rocks.”

Brown confirmed this account in an email to rhe Blade.

“I was dancing by myself to the music, when I felt a splash of water on my back,” he said. “I turned around to see what had happened. When asked why the water was thrown on me, they responded, ‘You’re a sissy battyman.'”

“Instantaneously I was attacked by the two ladies and two men with rocks and beer bottles,” added Brown. “I was helpless, because I was unable to defend myself.”

Brown was taken to the hospital.

D’Marco the Blade the police “were nowhere to be found” during the incident. She said local residents chased one of the men who allegedly attacked Brown and he is now in police custody.

“Thank God good Bahamians were around to run after the boys,” she told the Blade.

“These tourists are our bread and butter,” added D’Marco. “This stuff cannot be going ok at international events we host here in the Bahamas.”

Brown told the Blade he decided to visit the Bahamas “because that country is marketed as a safe haven for gays – gay cruises, one of the well traveled gay destinations.”

Consensual same-sex sexual relations are legal in the Bahamas, unlike in other English-speaking Caribbean countries in which colonial-era sodomy laws remain on the books. Anti-LGBT attitudes — especially among religious leaders and conservative politicians — remain commonplace.

“I never thought I would walk away with what seem to be a horrible nightmare that I can’t get away from,” Brown told the Blade.