A Clarke County grand jury recently indicted three Athens street gang members for an alleged brutal attack on a teen broadcast live on social media. The alleged Bloods gang members beat and stomped the 18-year-old victim the night of May 10 at Timber Chase apartments on Sycamore Drive, and they aired the assault as it happened on Facebook Live, according to Athens-Clarke County police.
According to police, the victim was attacked for having done or said something that “disrespected” members of the gang. Two suspects — Eddie Bernard Thomas, 28, and 24-year-old Cedric Vonterries Ballard — were arrested three days later after being identified by police from the Facebook video. Ballard was a Bloods member and Thomas belonged to the Crips street gang, according to the indictment.
A third gang member charged in the indictment for the attack was Ricky D. Whitehead Jr., 28, also identified as a Bloods member. According to the indictment, filed this week in Clarke County Superior Court, each defendant was charged with multiple violations of the Georgia Street Gang Terrorism and Prevention Act and two counts of aggravated assault.
Ballard was additionally charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon for having a rifle in an unspecified incident that occurred a week after the Facebook Live attack. The assault victim’s girlfriend learned about the attack from a friend who saw the Facebook Live video, police said. After she contacted the victim by phone, he told her he had made his way to another apartment complex on West Broad Street. She took a bus to the location and from there called 911, police said.
The victim was mostly incoherent and unable to provide much information, but police said they obtained a video of the beating, which identified two of the attackers as local street gang members.
The victim told police as many as four people might have attacked him. Ballard was one of seven suspects implicated in a November 2015 gang shootout in West Athens that killed an innocent bystander, 23-year-old Breana Blackwell, who was sitting in a parked car near the shooting.
Though police were unable to identify the person who fired the gun that killed Blackwell, all of the suspects were arrested in March for violating the street gang act. For the Facebook Live assault, Ballard was being held without bail at the Clarke County Jail and Thomas was being held in lieu of a $10,000 bond.
Whitehead was released from custody earlier this month after posting an $11,000 bond, according to court records.
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According to police, the victim was attacked for having done or said something that “disrespected” members of the gang. Two suspects — Eddie Bernard Thomas, 28, and 24-year-old Cedric Vonterries Ballard — were arrested three days later after being identified by police from the Facebook video. Ballard was a Bloods member and Thomas belonged to the Crips street gang, according to the indictment.
Ballard was additionally charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon for having a rifle in an unspecified incident that occurred a week after the Facebook Live attack. The assault victim’s girlfriend learned about the attack from a friend who saw the Facebook Live video, police said. After she contacted the victim by phone, he told her he had made his way to another apartment complex on West Broad Street. She took a bus to the location and from there called 911, police said.
The victim was mostly incoherent and unable to provide much information, but police said they obtained a video of the beating, which identified two of the attackers as local street gang members.
The victim told police as many as four people might have attacked him. Ballard was one of seven suspects implicated in a November 2015 gang shootout in West Athens that killed an innocent bystander, 23-year-old Breana Blackwell, who was sitting in a parked car near the shooting.
Though police were unable to identify the person who fired the gun that killed Blackwell, all of the suspects were arrested in March for violating the street gang act. For the Facebook Live assault, Ballard was being held without bail at the Clarke County Jail and Thomas was being held in lieu of a $10,000 bond.
Whitehead was released from custody earlier this month after posting an $11,000 bond, according to court records.
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