A man was convicted Monday of murder as a hate crime during his retrial on charges that he beat an Ecuadorean immigrant with an aluminum baseball bat after mistaking him and his brother for a gay couple.
Jurors deliberated for about seven hours before convicting Keith Phoenix in the death of Jose Sucuzhanay. He also was convicted of attempted assault as a hate crime in the attack on Romel Sucuzhanay.
The trial started about six weeks after the mistrial was declared on May 11 when a juror refused to deliberate.
The brothers were walking home from a bar after a party at a Brooklyn church on Dec. 7, 2008. Romel Sucuzhanay had put his coat around his brother to keep him warm and was helping him walk because he was drunk.
Meanwhile, Hakim Scott, 26 and Phoenix, 30, also leaving a party, pulled up in a sport utility vehicle. They began yelling anti-gay and anti-Hispanic slurs, according to Assistant District Attorney Josh Hanshaft.
