Gay man’s killing puts spotlight on Savannah Police practices

The killing of a gay man in Savannah last month has raised concerns among LGBTQ advocates about the Savannah Police Department’s once robust procedures and practices intended to keep their community safe from violence. 

SPD has arrested the suspected killer of Chris Allen Villegas Fentress, and officials have previously said it has no evidence to suggest the shooting was a hate crime. This week, the department did not respond to a request to comment about multiple social media posts apparently made by the detained man that contain anti-gay language after The Current brought the statements to the SPD’s attention.  

Meanwhile, the department broke with tradition by not sending an officer tasked as a liaison with the area’s queer community to a vigil organized on March 27 by Savannah Pride Center to mourn the loss of Villegas Fentress, 29, who volunteered for the group, the largest LGBTQ support center in the region. The former SPD officer who held that position told The Current that SPD had no handover when she retired in 2022, and the director of Savannah Pride said he didn’t even know such a position existed.

A review by The Current found that a task force set up by Savannah Mayor Van Johnson to respond to LGTBQ community concerns appears to have never met in person, according to Kurtis Purtee, who is a Savannah-Chatham school police officer and trainer, city alderman and openly-gay Savannahian. Purtee did not remember exactly when but said the task force “has not met in quite a long time.” Another task force member told The Current the last meeting he remembered was in early 2021. 

Savannah has long been a haven for LGTBQ people, yet nationwide attacks against queer Americans are on the rise. Attacks against LGTBQ individuals rose for the second year in a row in 2023, the latest year of data available, according to the country’s largest LGBTQ rights organization, the Human Rights Campaign, which analyzed hate crime data kept by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. 

One of the challenges Coastal Georgia’s queer community has in quantifying threats against them is a lack of data kept by SPD.

Hate crime statistics, as well as other violent crimes, are collated by the FBI each year, but SPD stopped reporting all statistics in 2021, due to its outdated records management system. 

Prior to that, SPD reported no hate crimes in their jurisdiction dating back to 1991, a situation that Michael Bell, executive director of the Savannah Pride Center, considers improbable given that smaller Georgia police departments have reported hate crimes during the same period. 

Purtee expressed skepticism about the amount of training SPD officers receive on investigating hate crimes.

“I’ll be honest with you, I don’t know that our police officers in Savannah really know, really, how to identify a hate crime,” Purtee told The Current. 

SPD did not respond to written questions about the department’s work supporting the LGBTQ community.

Mayor Johnson, who has been an advocate for Savannah’s LGBTQ community, says he thinks Savannah’s zero number is accurate.

“Since I’ve been mayor, we have not had a hate crime. And you know, the interesting thing about it is, is that it’s entirely possible, as we told the FBI, not to have a hate crime,” Johnson said. 

Johnson said he was not aware of anti-LGBTQ bias causing the crime against Villegas Fentress, but he says that if there is evidence, SPD’s highly trained investigators would act on it properly. 

Johnson, who put in place the PROUD Savannah task force in 2020, expressed frustration that Bell and the Pride Center did not involve SPD and himself more before raising public concerns.

“I started the task force specifically for the purposes of making sure that we facilitate communication so, I mean, no one, not anyone from the Pride Center, not Alderman Purtee or anyone else you know, said that there was an issue,” Johnson said.

Fentress was fatally shot at a Dollar General store in downtown Savannah over St. Patrick’s Day weekend, and Savannah police quickly arrested Johnathan Manson, 27, and charged him with murder. Manson was denied bond last month due to the seriousness of the offense. 

Police collaborative diminishes

For Tracy Walden, the former SPD LGBTQ liaison and the first openly-gay police officer to work for SPD, the current relationship between leaders of Savannah’s queer community and the department is a significant change since her tenure.

She became the department’s LGBTQ liaison in 2007 after the beating of a gay man, Travis McLain, in a downtown parking garage on St. Patrick’s Day led to accusations the police failed to properly investigate the crime. 

The program was called the “Savannah Police and Gay Community Collaborative.”

Walden said the role was unique, as she had a foot in two worlds. 

The purpose was for Savannah’s gay community to know “that if you feel like you aren’t being served properly by the police, there is somebody you can go to that will listen,” she told The Current in an interview.

For example, many in the queer community believed that the 2010 beating of a man in downtown Savannah by two Marines, was an an anti-gay assault and criticized SPD for not treating it as such. At the time, Walden urged patience and educated the public about the bar for hate crimes charges. The FBI later investigated and found there wasn’t evidence to support that charge. 

Former Chief Joseph Lumpkin dispatched Walden to comfort community members following the Pulse nightclub shooting in 2016, when a mass shooter killed 49 people at a gay club in Orlando. 

Walden said the department evolved to become more LGBTQ-friendly, employing more officers who were openly gay. She retired March 2022 and was disappointed when there was no formal transition process under former Chief Roy Minter for the liaison role that she had fostered.

“There was no handoff. It kind of was just shuttled,” Walden said. Minter’s tenure ended in 2022, and Chief Lenny Gunther was promoted as the department’s current chief. 

The Current sent an Open Records Act request to SPD for all reports, policies and training materials for the LGBTQ liaison program. The department responded and did not have any records to offer. 

“To me, that’s an opportunity to improve,” Mayor Johnson said about the lack of training materials.

Cpl. Miles Taylor, who uses they/them pronouns, is the current department liaison to the queer community. They acknowledged that the transition from Walden’s tenure was “rough.” Taylor said they had to miss the March vigil because they were working the night shift, part of their duties as a patrol officer.

“After (Walden) left, it was just kind of like, ‘Hey, I know that you’re part of this community. Do you think that this is something that you would like to be a representative for?’” Taylor said of the handoff.

Walden said if she was still serving then attendance at the vigil for Villegas Fentress would have been mandatory. 

“If the community was calling for police support, I would go,” Walden said of her role as liaison. “If I personally wanted to go, I would probably still go in my uniform to represent the police department.”

On the day of the vigil, Bell, who took over the Pride Center last year, said he was not aware Savannah even had a LGBTQ liaison. 

Asked about this, Taylor said that they and Bell are well-acquainted. 

“I don’t really know what he meant by that, but I know that he and I have talked,” Taylor said. “My information is also in the directory that the Pride Center provides.”

Social media posts by accused shooter

In recent years, Savannah’s homicide unit reported high rates for solving murders. 

In the case of Villegas Fentress, strong eyewitness statements, including by the dead man’s friends appear to have helped make a swift arrest.

It is unclear, however, how much weight SPD has given to information that the suspect used multiple homophobic slurs before he shot the Pride Center volunteer. 

The Current reviewed social media platforms that appear to be registered to the suspected shooter and found four posts that included anti-gay language similar to phrases that witnesses told Bell that Manson made before Villegas Fentress’ death. 

Those posts came from a Facebook account registered to Johnathan Manson of Savannah, with photos that appear to be the same person in the suspect’s jail mugshot. Three posts were from fall 2020 while the fourth is from July 2021.

Manson’s public defender did not respond to requests for comment.

‘No hate crimes’

While SPD says the investigation remains open, Purtee says Villegas Fentress’ death should be a warning for area police departments to boost training about hate crimes. 

“I don’t know that we’ve ever really fully been understanding of how the hate crime statute applies to some of these crimes that we’re seeing,” Purtee said. “I find it very, very hard to believe that a city our size, we’ve had zero hate crimes reported.”

Advocates have asked SPD to overhaul its hate crimes tracking for years. 

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Dusty Church, a former board member for the First City Pride Center, said it was brought up after Mayor Van Johnson’s 2019 election. Johnson put in place the PROUD Savannah task force, of which Church was a member. (Editor’s Note: Church is a board member for The Current).

The Current filed an Open Records Act request for all meeting minutes by the task force and any reports written by the body. The mayor’s office reported that no such records existed.

The task force successfully pushed to add anti-bias policies to city ordinances. Purtee, a task force member, said he remembered the group asked former Chief Minter about hate crimes.

“He was like, ‘No hate crimes. We haven’t received any of the information. Same thing (the) next year,” Purtee said. “And I’m thinking, ‘No, this can’t be right.’”

Legislatively, Purtee said he wants to create a governing body, like the Human Relations Commission in Atlanta, that would include community members and investigate instances of discrimination and bias. 

Taylor, the SPD liaison, is trained on identifying hate crimes, they said. Taylor also serves as a resource for other officers who have sensitive questions throughout the course of their work. 

“When teenagers come out, or, you know when a family has an issue with, like, it’s a cultural, a cultural misunderstanding,” Taylor said, “Sometimes just having that conversation with (officers) prior to the call, or, you know, answering the questions while they’re on the call.”

Regarding the Villegas Fentress case, Purtee said he believes Chief Gunther is receptive to conversations about hate crimes “and wants to do the right thing.”

“I don’t know if this is hate crime or not,” Purtee said, “but certainly we have to look at every aspect of it because there’s a community that is rallying up behind the killing of this young person.”