Gigi Levin said she wasn’t particularly shocked when she heard a group of classmates were accused of luring a gay man into an apartment and assaulting him.

“This is an issue that is rooted in the culture of our campus,” said Levin, a 24-year-old student at Salisbury University in Montgomery County. “Administration can help, but ultimately we are responsible for our safety as LGBTQ+ students.”

Levin was one of the first to arrive Monday afternoon at a vigil planned by an LGBTQ+ faculty group after University President Carolyn Ringer Lepre announced in an email to campus last week that several students were arrested. The Salisbury Police Department charged 12 men, all students between 18 and 21 years old, with first degree assault, false imprisonment, reckless endangerment and related hate crimes.

For Levin and her colleagues, the news shook an already tenuous sense of security on the Eastern Shore campus of about 7,000 students, which looked like something out of a college brochure on that unseasonably warm fall day. Levin stood in the square near the Guerrieri Academic Commons, wringing his hands in worry.

“I was bullied by classmates because of my sexual orientation,” Levin said, recalling one time a classmate followed her and told her to turn to Jesus after she refused a Bible. “It’s hard to be here sometimes.”

Several hundred people turned out for Monday’s vigil for the victim of the alleged hate crime, who suffered non-life-threatening injuries. Faculty, staff, students and community members gathered in the square, decked out in pride flags, buttons and house signs.

Police said the incident, which was captured on video and shared on TikTok, began when Salisbury students used Grindr, a dating app used primarily by gay men, and Snapchat to lure the victim to an apartment. the police said they posed as a 16-year-old interested in sexual relations with the 40-year-old.

The now-deleted TikTok video has circulated elsewhere online, showing a group of youths hitting an elderly man with various objects and their fists, surrounding him as he he is sitting on a chair.

“You’re not going anywhere,” says one of the attackers as several men surround and grab the victim, pulling him to the ground. As he tries to get up, his attackers repeatedly punch, slap and kick him.

The youths repeatedly call the older man a slur used against gay men, as well as a “menace to society.”

Attorney James L. Britt, representing one of the students accused in the incident, told The Banner last week that “once all the facts come to light, this case will prove to be a baseless attempt to expose someone willing to travel to have sex with a 16-year-old child.”

In Maryland, the age of consent is generally 16.

One of the speakers at Monday’s vigil, Mark DeLancey, told the crowd that he personally knew the victim, who he says was not a predator.

“There are rumors that the victim was a pedophile and nothing, I repeat, nothing could be further from the truth,” DeLancey said. “To blame and shame the victim of this crime is one of the most disgusting things I can think of.”

DeLancey said he had known the victim, whom he called a friend, for years.

“He needs your support right now,” DeLancey told the crowd. “He is a wonderful human being. I think he will be very proud and very happy to see you all here today.”

Sage Simone, one of the event’s organizers and speakers, said he was proud of the turnout. “I was upset when I learned about the attacks. Salisbury is my community.”

Unlike Levin, Simone said they generally felt safe on campus. Although, they noted, they usually use a buddy system when they go to their car.

Angela Freeman — an assistant professor of biology and one of the leaders of the Lambda Society, the LGBTQ+ faculty and staff group that helped plan the vigil — said she’s trying to create more “safe spaces” on campus. Surrounded by students rushing to class in backpacks, Freeman looked more tired than the average college professor. Last week, between the news of the attacked man and the presidential election, was tough.

“I wasn’t in a great place because of the election, and then I get the email from President Lepre and I’m like, ‘How is this happening?'” Freeman said. “I don’t understand how this is still happening. I’m so sad.”

Former President Donald Trump won the majority of the vote in Wicomico County, where Salisbury’s campus is located. In his first term, Trump tried to repeal protections for LGBTQ+ Americans.

The Princeton Review ranks Salisbury in the 20th unfriendliest college the LGBTQ+ community in the country.

The university’s president announced the formation of an LGBTQ+ rights task force in an email to campus Thursday, which he said is “just the beginning.”

“Acts of violence against the LGBT community are unacceptable,” Lepre told The Baltimore Banner after speaking at the vigil. “It is not at all consistent with the values ​​of the university.”

Zharia Blackston, a student studying theater, said she hopes the university administration will work to create more spaces for the LGBTQ+ community on campus, including more dedicated events and partnerships with LGBTQ+ groups in the region.

“I really hope, more than anything else, that the administration actually starts doing things,” they said.

About Education Hub

This report is part of The Banner’s Education Hub, community-funded journalism that gives parents the resources they need to make decisions about how their children learn. Read more.