Feds Charge Florida Racist Duo With Hate Crimes for Vile Axe Attack Against a Black Man in 2017

By Edward Era Barbacena

Two Florida men have been charged with federal hate crimes after allegedly violently attacking a Black man in November 2017. In an indictment, Roy Lashley, 55, and Robert Lashley, 52, are accused of yelling racial slurs at the victim, identified only as D.B., while also hitting him with their fists and an axe handle.

 The pair, egging each other on, willfully injured D.B., a Black man, because of his “actual and perceived race,” the indictment says. When the pair were arrested last year on state charges, arrest reports said the 24-year-old victim told police he was walking away from a Dollar General store when he heard a man yelling racial slurs at him from a parking lot. 

Witnesses said both brothers then ran across the road and started attacking the man before Roy Lashley told Robert they should leave “before the cops get here.” When police arrived, the victim was found lying on a median strip.