Man to sue neighbors over beating

David James Bell, the man who was recently acquitted of child kidnapping and burglary charges, announced Monday that he and his live-in partner plan to sue their former neighbors for beating the two men in what Bell termed a "hate crime." Both are gay men.

Bell, 31, told news reporters at the Gallivan Plaza that he and Daniel Fair intend to file civil lawsuits against various people who once lived next door to them in a South Salt Lake neighborhood.

Bell also has not ruled out possibly bringing a lawsuit against the South Salt Lake Police Department.

Both Bell and Fair were badly beaten after neighbors mistakenly believed the men had kidnapped two of their children, according to Bell's criminal defense lawyers.

Bell said that on July 4, 2008, he had been looking for his lost cat, stopped at the next door neighbor's house where an outdoor party was going on, had some drinks and sang with people there, then went home for more Kool-Aid to which he would add alcohol.

He said he saw two young children standing in the neighbor's yard who asked for "juice" and he told them he could not give them what was in his glass, but went to his house to get two smaller glasses of Kool-Aid that did not contain alcohol. The children followed him and stood in a doorway and drank the Kool-Aid he gave them. "I told them, 'Hey, let's go find your mommy,' " he said.

But almost immediately Lulu Latu, the mother of one of the children, came rushing in, began screaming at him and smacked him repeatedly, knocking him into the refrigerator.

Bell said Latu grabbed the kids and, in a profanity-laced tirade, suggested he lock the doors because he and his partner "were dead" once her family found out the children had been there.

People from the party rushed into his house and began beating him and Fair, according to Bell. Bell said he was dragged outdoors, had his face smashed repeatedly into the concrete of his carport and was cut with shards of glass on his neck, chest and one foot. He said he has a permanent hearing loss in one ear, suffers from post-traumatic stress syndrome and even pulled up his shirt and took off a sock to display scars.

Bell said he ran away but was chased by partygoers, who beat him again until he was unconscious. "I believe it turned into a hate crime," he said.

Susanne Gustin, one of the defense attorneys at Bell's trial, said South Salt Lake police did a poor job of investigating these assaults as well as the alleged kidnapping.

She faulted the police for not sealing the two houses off as crime scenes, not calling out the crime scene unit, not gathering enough physical evidence or conducting sufficient interviews.