Daryl Jackson, who police say was attacked in a hate crime, rests in a hospital room at Nassau University Medical Center in East Meadow. (Photo by Peter Walden Sr. / March 8, 2009)
Nassau police have arrested four men and are looking for a fifth after a group of Hispanic men, yelling racial slurs and wielding baseball bats, attacked a black man in front of a Roosevelt deli Sunday, county and police officials said.
Daryl Jackson, 52, of Roosevelt, was in stable condition Sunday at Nassau University Medical Center, where he was being treated for head, neck and back injuries.
"I'm in very bad pain," Jackson said in an interview in his hospital room. "I don't understand it. I wasn't bothering anyone."
Jackson said he was standing in front of the deli on Nassau Road at about 8:15 a.m. when three Hispanic men told him to move.
Jackson told them he was waiting to use a pay phone, and one of the men used a racial epithet toward him, he said.
"I said, 'I don't like to be called names' and the other said, 'Go back to Africa,' " he recalled from his hospital bed, where he wore an immobilizing neck brace and took medicine through a straw.
"There's no question that a violent crime has taken place and there's no question that racial epithets were used in the attack," Nassau County Executive Thomas Suozzi said. "It's a heinous crime and people will pay for it."
Suozzi said police were investigating to determine whether the attack was motivated by race, or whether there were other factors involved, before they could rule it a hate crime.
Hempstead Town Councilwoman Dorothy Goosby, whose district includes Roosevelt, said a town employee saw the beating and stopped it.
Dave Tillery, 39, of Freeport, said he was driving along Nassau Road when he saw eight Hispanic men - some wielding bats - beating Jackson and yelling racial slurs.
"I jumped out of my car and I told the guys, 'Hey, hey, what are you doing?' " he said. The attackers then fled, he said.
A police source said Jackson often uses a pay phone in front of the deli, where regular customers are both black and Hispanic.
The source said that police know the name of the fifth suspect. Witnesses and the arrested men have confirmed that racial slurs were used during the attack, the source said.
Speaking to Newsday last night, Jackson said he works as a bouncer at a lounge near the deli.
"I told them this is a free country and I can stand where I want to stand," he recalled. "I said, 'Why are you bothering me?' and then they surrounded me and they started beating me. I tried to get away and one of them hit me in the back of my neck. I felt two hits . . . and then I lost consciousness."
Tillery, a school safety officer for Uniondale public schools and an employee with Hempstead's traffic department, said he was wearing his school safety uniform at the time, which may have made the men think he was a police officer.
Goosby said the town will issue a proclamation next week to recognize Tillery as a Good Samaritan.
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