Teen is sentenced to 20 years for fatally beating homeless man

BALTIMORE (AP) -- A teenager has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for the beating death of a homeless man in an attack he and his friends called "bum stomping."

Daniel Ennis, 18, who was sentenced Friday, pleaded guilty in May to second-degree murder in the death of Gerald Joseph Holle, a 55-year-old transient living under a bridge.

Prosecutors said the attack was an effort by Ennis and his friends to "clean up" their neighborhood by beating homeless men until they died or left the area.

Michael Farmer, 20, pleaded guilty last year to first-degree murder in Holle's death, as well as the bludgeoning death of 46-year-old George Williams.

The deaths were among a series of attacks on homeless men in 2001 in which three were killed and five others were hospitalized.

The teenagers were charged after they bragged about the attacks, which they called "bum stomping," according to prosecutor Michelle Grunwell. They used baseball bats, a crowbar, a steel pole and wooden sticks, Grunwell said.

Farmer will be sentenced after he testifies against the third man charged in Holle's death, Harold "Jay" Waterbury, 19, of Baltimore, prosecutors said.

Waterbury also is charged in the deaths of Williams and a third homeless man, Harry Lawhorn, 47. His trial is scheduled for Aug. 5.