By William Thornton
Alabama Media Group
SYLACAUGA, Ala. — Brandi Allen says she learned her son Brian Ogle had been beaten Friday night only moments after she caught sight of him while she drove by.
“I wish I had stopped,” she said. “Or maybe it wouldn’t have happened.”
Now Allen says her son is looking at more than a month of treatment and rehab in the hospital after he was the victim of a beating Friday night following a Sylacauga High School football game in an attack that authorities say was possibly racially motivated.
Sylacauga police said investigators have met with Talladega County District Attorney Steve Giddens to obtain warrants for suspects in the assault.
Police say Ogle was assaulted in the parking lot of an old hardware store Friday night. He is being treated at UAB Hospital for multiple head injuries. Police are still looking into whether the assault could be considered a hate crime.
Police have appealed to community members to be “responsible” in their reaction and “stop the negative posts on social media.”
“Our community will never come together as long as your posts are racially motivated,” the police stated in a Facebook post on the department’s page.
Ogle is currently still in intensive care in critical condition. Doctors are examining him to see if bleeding has stopped on his brain, Allen said. The pain is too intense for him to open his eyes, and he only speaks rarely, she said.
He does not seem to have any memory of the attack.
“He doesn’t remember what happened, and they say he’ll probably never get that memory back, and I’m glad,” she said. “He says, ‘Momma, take me home.’ He doesn’t know why he’s here. And we’re going to have to get ready to celebrate his 18th birthday here Oct. 21. I’m going to have to tell him why he’s here. He’s not going to understand.”
Allen says she believes her son was beaten because he responded to a post on social media with the phrase “I Back the Blue.” She said this came after a disagreement at school over “Black Lives Matter” T-shirts. She says he began receiving threats immediately after.
On Friday night, she said she was skeptical about letting him go to the football game after the threats, but relented.
“I thought, ‘He’s a senior, this is his last homecoming, let it go,’” she said. Allen said she picked up his younger brother and saw Brian as she drove to a restaurant. She thought about stopping, but “didn’t want to embarrass him.”
“I go home, I pull into the driveway, and my husband ran out of the house saying Brian just got jumped on. I just lost it,” she said, weeping.
“I think I’m still in shock about how all of this happened. My heart hurts because I don’t - I can’t understand how someone could do something like this to my child. They don’t even know him. I would love to bring all of those guys (who beat him) up here and let them look at him,” she said.
Allen described her son as a person who is outgoing and loving, active in sports, with friends of different races. She said this year he offered to give up his savings to allow a foster child to attend a prom.
“My son has been made into this awful, racist person that he is not,” she said. “He doesn’t care where you live. He doesn’t care what kind of car you drive. I just wish the people who did this to my son could know they missed out on having a good friend.”
Friends have organized a GoFundMe page for Ogle’s family, and Allen said she has received messages of support from many in the community.
“I want something good to come out of this,” she said. “This can’t keep happening. This has got to stop.”