- April 28, 2024
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A local father beat his teenage son Feb. 4 because the teen was wearing makeup, according to the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office.
The crime was reported Feb. 7 by a local teacher, who told deputies that the teen had told him that his father, 33-year-old Lomack Bennett, had busted the teen’s lip, according to Bennett‘s arrest report.
The teen had recorded photos of his injuries on his school-issued computer.
When a deputy spoke to the teen, the teen said that his mother had noticed that he was wearing makeup when she picked him up from school on Feb 4, according to the report.
The teen usually applied makeup once he was at school and took it off before going home, and had tried to this time, he told the deputy.
But his mother noticed, and told him to wipe it off. As he began wiping his face off with a baby wipe, his mother yelled to Bennett, who's had multiple prior arrests for battery, burglary and an assortment of drug charges, that the teen was wearing makeup.
Bennett, the teen said, started asking him about his sexual orientation, then slapped him and choked him.
Bennett then threw the teen against the floor and then against his bed, then slapped him across the face so hard that blood splattered across his glasses, the teen said.
Bennett then yelled at the teen to clean himself up, according to the teen.
Deputies spoke to the teen’s mother, who denied seeing his father hit him, but acknowledged that she’d seen the teen’s injured lip.
Bennett called the teen’s mother during the investigation and spoke with a deputy, saying that he’d confronted the teen and told him that he “wasn’t old enough to make decisions like that,” according to the report. He denied hitting the teen.
Deputies believed the evidence supported the teen’s account, and arrested Bennett.
Bennett is charged with Child Abuse Without Great Bodily Harm and with Domestic Battery by Strangulation.
It is up to the State Attorney’s Office to determine whether the case meets the legal criteria to be charged as a hate crime, Sheriff Rick Staly said.
