BEATING VICTIM TRIED TO BUY CRACK, COMPLAINT SAYS

He Objected After Cash Was Taken, Complaint Against 2 Teens Says

A man who was critically beaten by a mob of up to 30 assailants told
police the attack occurred after he lost money in an unsuccessful
attempt to buy crack, according to a criminal complaint filed Saturday.

Samuel McClain said he gave a man $19 "expecting to get crack cocaine
in return," then complained to a group milling in the street that he
had "just been ripped off by the by the guy who drove away," the
complaint says.

During an ensuing quarrel, McClain told police, he was suddenly
attacked from behind, knocked off his feet, then punched, kicked and
stomped into unconsciousness.

The complaint charges two teenagers with participating in the attack
and is the first time authorities have said McClain was not dragged
out of his car and beaten by a mob after honking his horn, as he
originally told police.

The complaint does not indicate when McClain told the authorities
about the attempted crack purchase, but police previously have
indicated that he told them he was attacked while still in his car.

One of those charged Saturday, Latrail Chie Ball, told police the
attack occurred spontaneously after McClain, 50, angered a gathering
of young people who had been "playing music, dancing in the street
and talking about their New Year resolutions," the complaint says.

The first person to call police about the gathering did so before the
beating started, complaining at 10:33 p.m. that a crowd was in the
street drinking and firing gunshots.

Eight minutes later, a series of callers told police that a mob had
ganged up on a man and was beating him viciously.

When police arrived, they found McClain facedown in the street, his
face covered in blood, his eyes swollen shut and his forehead "caved in."

The attack has received considerable coverage in the national press.

Ball, 17, and Jamael Avery Robinson, 17, were charged in the
complaint with first-degree reckless injury.

Three juveniles, two 16 and one 14, are being held in secure
detention, pending the filing of juvenile delinquency petitions. All
three appeared in Children's Court on Thursday and were ordered to
remain in custody, pending a hearing Tuesday.

The complaint filed Saturday says the investigation is ongoing and
that the information provided in the charging document concerns "only
one small part of the investigation thus far."

"Numerous eyewitnesses have been interviewed and given vivid
descriptions" of the way the mob - numbering 15 to 30 young men - set
upon McClain, the complaint says.

McClain, a father of 12, was treated at Froedtert Memorial Lutheran
Hospital in Wauwatosa for several days after the beating. He was no
longer hospitalized on Saturday. The two men charged Saturday live in
the neighborhood where McClain was beaten.

Ball's older brother, Laron Ball, was shot and killed by a police
detective after Laron Ball injured a sheriff's deputy in a Milwaukee
County courtroom in May 2002. Laron Ball, 20, grabbed the deputy's
gun moments after a jury returned a guilty verdict convicting him of murder.

Victim familiar to attackers

McClain told police he arrived in the neighborhood about 10:30 p.m.
Dec. 26, parked his car and walked toward a man seated in a parked
vehicle with a broken window, giving him $19 for some crack. After
the man drove away, McClain approached the group assembled nearby and
complained.

According to the complaint:

Robinson said he knew McClain as "Sam" because he "often comes to
that neighborhood for crack cocaine." Robinson told police that after
the man drove away with McClain's $19, McClain stood momentarily in
the middle of street "mad because he never got his crack," then
approached the group and began yelling.

Ball told police that he and two other young men "begged" McClain to
leave, "but he wouldn't listen."

The man who left with the money returned during the outburst,
according to Robinson. When McClain approached him, that man and
another man, identified only by nicknames, began throwing punches.

After McClain fell to the pavement, others in the crowd turned on the
victim, kicking him, punching him, hitting him with bottles, jumping
on him from the hoods of parked cars and pelting him with ice balls.

Ball said he ran up to McClain and kicked him "one hard time" in the
ribs, then left after receiving a cell phone call from his girlfriend
who told him to come home. Robinson said, however, that Ball stomped
on McClain's back "about six times."

Robinson said he eventually joined in the attack, kicking McClain
twice in the side, punching him twice and hurling an ice ball at the
back of the victim's head "all while Sam lay on the street."

Robinson said McClain was "yelling and screaming" throughout the
beating, until police sirens sent the assailants running. A police
officer who found McClain in the street said McClain couldn't speak
when he was turned over, managing only "gurgling."

Robinson, who had never before been arrested, apologized for his
involvement. He said he simply was "caught up in the beating" and "in
the wrong place at the wrong time," the complaint says.

Ball said he was sad and wished he could "take back that moment."

Ball identified several other assailants after looking
overphotographs provided by police. He said there were "plenty more,"
then added: "You don't have their pictures and I don't know their names."

The charges were filed as Milwaukee hip-hop/rhythm and blues radio
station WKKV-FM (100.7) sponsored an "Increase the Peace" rally in a
drugstore parking lot one block away from the beating scene in the
4700 block of N. 36th St. The rally was staged to point out that
street violence was destroying parts of the city, station host Reggie
Brown told about 35 people during the event.

"These crimes have been very senseless," Brown said. "What are some
of the things that we can do about them?"

The rally was part of the station's afternoon programming Saturday.

During the gathering, leaders from community service organizations,
elected officials, local hip-hop artists and onlookers took the
microphone from Brown.

"We have to do a better job of educating our kids," state Rep. Jason
Fields (D-Milwaukee) said.

"I used to live in this neighborhood," Sylvester Wilson, 37, told the
crowd and listeners. "I used to be in a gang, and let me tell you
guys to your face, this gang stuff is no good."