A judge sentenced a Georgia man to 40 years in prison Wednesday for throwing boiling water on a gay couple in February.
Jurors deliberated for about 90 minutes after the three-day trial before finding Martin Blackwell, 48, guilty of 10 counts. He was convicted of eight counts of aggravated battery and two counts of aggravated assault.
Blackwell was sentenced to the maximum prison time under the law for the attack on February 12. Anthony Gooden, 24, the son of Blackwell’s girlfriend, Kim Foster, and Marquez Tolbert, 21, suffered severe burns that required surgery.
Shortly before the attack, Gooden announced to his family that he was gay, according to the Washington Post. After working an overnight shift at a warehouse, Gooden and his partner, Tolbert, were sleeping on a mattress in his mother’s living room. They had been dating for about six weeks.
Blackwell, a long-distance truck driver, was also staying with Foster and her sister in College Park while in town. When he saw the two men lying unconscious next to each other, he went to the kitchen and boiled a large pot of water. Afterward, he poured the scalding water onto the gay couple.
“I woke up to the most imaginable pain in my life,” Tolbert said, the Washington Post reported. “I’m wondering why I’m in so much pain. I’m wondering why I’m wet. I don’t understand what’s going on.”
According to the publication, he recalled Blackwell yanking him off the mattress and yelling, “Get out of my house with all that gay.”
The truck driver accused the two men of having sexual intercourse when he poured the water over them. However, Tolbert’s friend, Vickie Gray, dismissed those claims, according to the Washington Post.
His attorney, Monique Walker, said Blackwell’s intention was not to hurt them. Instead, he just wanted to stop the young men’s disrespectful behavior, rushhourdaily.com reported.
“They were stuck together like hot dogs… so I poured a little hot water on them and helped them out,” Blackwell told police, according to the news site. “… They’ll be alright. It was just a little hot water.”
Yet, “a little hot water” caused both men to undergo skin grafts and surgery. Tolbert has to wear compression garments 23 hours a day for the next two years. Moreover, he is attending weekly counseling and physical therapy sessions to deal with the effects of the traumatic experience.
On the other hand, Gooden was burned even more severely, with 60 percent of his body injured. Not only was he in a medically induced coma for two weeks, but he also received skin graft surgery for his face, neck, back, arms, chest and head.
“The pain doesn’t let you sleep. It is excruciating, 24 hours a day and it doesn’t go anywhere and it doesn’t down it’s just there,” Tolbert said.
Meanwhile, he’s “ecstatic” that “justice has been served.”
Fulton County superior court judge Henry Newkirk said Blackwell could’ve backed out while he was waiting for the pot of water to boil.
“You had so many outs, you had so many outs where the voice of reason could’ve taken over,” Newkirk said, according to The Guardian.
However, it said Blackwell showed no reaction when the verdict was announced.
