Bigotry, Meet Road Rage: Man Attacks Gay Couple for Walking a Pink Poodle

He verbally and physically assaulted the men, who were doing nothing but walking their dog.

Last Friday, Oregonian David Beltier was walking with his boyfriend, Jeremy Mark, and their pink Poodle, Beauty. (Beauty was pink thanks to a Kool-Aid dye job. Don't worry about that right now.)

They were doing nothing but walking their dog. 

Beltier said, "We weren't holding hands or anything. Just walking the dog like normal."

A man drove by in an SUV and screamed terrible things at them; he used gay slurs, he called them un-American, he said it's "not right for that dog to be that color."

A complete and horrible person, in other words. Also, a violent one. He made a U-turn in his SUV. 

"When he made the U-turn, I knew this was not going to end well," Beltier said. "He burned rubber. He sped up. There was no way he did not want to attack me."

And he did. He jumped out of the truck started swinging, hitting Beltier on the shoulder. Then he returned to his truck for a metal wrench and continued the assault, hitting Beltier behind the ear. Then he drove off.

"Honestly, I feel like the pink poodle provoked him," Beltier said. 

"I'm just thankful he didn't have a more serious weapon like a gun and pull it out," said Jeremy Mark, Beltier's boyfriend.

Thankfully, it didn't take long for police to find him, thanks to many witnesses who recorded his license plate number (and honked, stopped, and generally put a stop to the assault). George Allen Mason Jr. is now in Washington County Jail on a slew of charges, one of them "second-degree intimidation," which is Oregon's bias-crime statute. 

As for that dye job, Beltier says it's non-toxic, harmless fun. It comes out after a few washes. 

Via the Oregonian

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