Outlaw Motorcycle Club Member Sentenced |
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Topics: Outlaws
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U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Massachusetts
July 28, 2009
BOSTON—A member of the Outlaws Motorcycle Club has been sentenced in federal court for assaulting a black patron in a restaurant in Ashland because of his race and because he was enjoying the services of the restaurant.
Acting Attorney General Loretta King of the Civil Rights Division for the Department of Justice, Acting United States Attorney Michael K. Loucks and Warren T. Bamford, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation - Boston Field Office, announced that STEPHAN STELMACH, age 35, formerly of Ashland, MA was sentenced by United States District Judge William G. Young to six months' imprisonment, to be followed by one year supervised release, after being charged with interfering by force with the federally protected rights of a black man in an incident at T.J.'s Restaurant in June 2005. STELMACH pled guilty in April 2009. Two trials, in September and December 2007, resulted in hung juries for STELMACH and an acquittal of another Outlaw member.
At the trials, evidence showed that before encountering the victim, STELMACH had been overheard at the restaurant using racial epithets and bragging about previously beating up another black man. Later, while the victim and his girlfriend were eating, STELMACH went to their table and accused them of staring at him and asked, “Do you have a problem with me?” When the victim began to stand up, STELMACH punched him and they wrestled to the ground.
Another Outlaw member, who had been on his way out of the restaurant, came over and struck the victim with a ball peen hammer in the lower back and side. STELMACH and the other Outlaw member then fled on their motorcycles and were later arrested by Ashland Police. The case was investigated by agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation with the cooperation of the Ashland Police Department. It was prosecuted by S. Theodore Merritt of the U.S. Attorney’s Office and Trial Attorney Forrest Christian of the Criminal Section, Civil Rights Division, Department of Justice.