CHELSEA — Locals reeled Thursday at an attack at the West 23rd Street Dallas BBQ in which a customer shouted homophobic slurs at two gay men, then bashed them over the head with a chair.
Locals stopped outside the Eighth Avenue restaurant to read a note from management, which said they were "deeply saddened by the altercation between two patrons" and that they "will not tolerate violent or hateful behavior in their restaurants."
The NYPD's Hate Crimes Task Force is now investigating the incident as a possible bias attack, a spokesman said.
Vladan, 34, fled Serbia to Chelsea because of persecution for being gay. He would not give his last name because of concern about retribution there.
"It’s not just one incident. It’s more. It’s huge. And I’m very happy that somebody recorded that," he said of the attack, which was caught on video.
Vladan, who walks his dogs past Dallas BBQ daily with his husband, was shaken by the violence he came here to escape.
“It takes me like four months to be open and live it out,” he said. "If New York is not that place, where is that place that I can be normal or free?"
So far this year, the city has seen 16 sexual orientation-based hate crimes, including two in Manhattan below 59th Street, according to police figures. There were 10 such crimes in southern Manhattan last year, and 31 citywide, the NYPD said.
Michael McAllister, 46, who lives in Chelsea's Fulton Houses, said the Chelsea Dallas BBQ is as frequented by gay customers as any other neighborhood joint.
"This is a gay-ish area," he said. "This Dallas BBQ is not like 42nd Street, its clientele."
McAllister thought the attacker should be charged with a hate crime. "Even if he wasn’t from the neighborhood, we all have some common sense," he said.
Michael Steinbrick, 50 and a trainer at the New York Sports Club across the street, said he had heard of other anti-gay attacks in the neighborhood in recent years, but that they were rarely caught on video.
"It’s going to happen more and more, the way it’s happening with police brutality," he said. "We’re seeing it more because of social media."
Steinbrick said he, like Snipes, would have approached someone who called him a "f-----t."
"Being bullied when I was a kid, I have little triggers," he said. "So even when I heard about it, it pulled out some anger in me."
