Already garnering unwelcome attention for its spiraling gun violence, Chicago was thrust into the national media spotlight Thursday as hate crime charges were filed against four kidnapping suspects accused of broadcasting a live Facebook video of their attack on a mentally disabled man while yelling obscenities about Donald Trump and "white people." 
 
 The racially charged video showing the assailants cutting the 18-year-old victim's scalp with a knife, punching and kicking him and laughing as they repeatedly forced his head into a toilet, was aired on news stations worldwide and prompted strong reaction from political leaders of every stripe. 
 
 It also marked a shocking level of brazenness even at a time when smartphones can be used like satellite feeds. While criminal investigations have increasingly included evidence from social media posts, live broadcasting a crime in progress is exceedingly rare — let alone an allegedly racially motivated attack. 
 
 "I can't understand why anybody put anything on Facebook," Near North Area Commander Kevin Duffin said when asked about the video at an afternoon news conference at Chicago police headquarters. 
 
 Chicago police speak to the news media about the attack of a man with special needs that was captured in a Facebook Live video and the resulting charges filed against four people suspected of the attack. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune) Chicago police speak to the news media about the attack of a man with special needs that was captured in a Facebook Live video and the resulting charges filed against four people suspected of the attack. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune) SEE MORE VIDEOS 
 
 President Barack Obama called the news from his hometown "despicable" and said the Internet has exposed long simmering racial tensions. 
 
 "What we have seen as surfacing, I think, are a lot of problems that have been there a long time," Obama told Chicago's WBBM-TV Ch. 2 in a prearranged interview in Washington. "Whether it's tensions between police and communities, (or) hate crimes of the despicable sort that has just now recently surfaced on Facebook." 
 
 Charged in the attack were Jordan Hill, 18, of Carpentersville; Tesfaye Cooper, 18, of Chicago; and sisters Brittany Covington, 18, and Tanishia Covington, 24, who lived in an apartment in the 3300 block of West Lexington Street where the assault allegedly took place. 
 
 The four — who are all African-American — were each charged with aggravated kidnapping, hate crime, aggravated unlawful restraint and aggravated battery with a deadly weapon, according to police. Hill also was charged with robbery, possession of a stolen motor vehicle and residential burglary, while both Covingtons were charged with residential burglary, police said. 
 
 Police said all four have given statements admitting to their roles in the alleged attack. They're scheduled to appear for a bond hearing Friday at the Leighton Criminal Court Building. 
 
 Late Thursday, David Boyd, who identified himself as the victim's brother-in-law, said in a brief statement to reporters that the family was grateful for "all the prayers and efforts" that led to his safe return. 
 
 "He's doing well, as well as he could be at this time," Boyd said. He said "everyone has seen the video" but declined to comment on what he thought of it. 
 
 "We appreciate all the support from everyone," Boyd said, adding they were focused on "trying to stick together as a family." 
 
 Facebook Live video posted on Jan. 3, 2017, shows the verbal and physical attack of a mentally disabled man. The Chicago Tribune edited this video to protect the victim's identity and for time. (Warning: Contains graphic content) Facebook Live video posted on Jan. 3, 2017, shows the verbal and physical attack of a mentally disabled man. The Chicago Tribune edited this video to protect the victim's identity and for time. (Warning: Contains graphic content) SEE MORE VIDEOS 
 
 Police said the victim, who is white, was found walking with Hill in the 3400 block of West Lexington Street about 5:15 p.m. Tuesday. The victim appeared "injured" and "confused" and was wearing little clothing despite the freezing temperatures, police said. 
 
 "I observed him wearing a tank top, inside-out, backwards, jean shorts and sandals on," Harrison District Officer Michael Donnelly said at the news conference. "He was bloodied. He was battered. He was very discombobulated." 
 
 Police ran his name and discovered he'd been reported missing Monday by his parents, who said he disappeared after they dropped him off at a McDonald's in suburban Streamwood to meet up with Hill on Saturday. Police said Hill knew the victim because they had attended the same school in Aurora. 
 
 According to police, Hill had stolen a van in Streamwood before picking up the victim and passed it off as his own. He and the victim then drove to Chicago's West Side, visiting with friends for two days. The victim slept in the van before being brought to the Covington sisters' apartment on West Lexington on Tuesday, police said. 
 
 Hours into the visit, the victim and Hill got into a "play fight" that got out of hand, police said. The sisters got angry and tied the victim up, according to police. 
 
 "That's when the attack begins," said Duffin, the police commander. 
 
 The chilling Facebook video shows the victim crouched in a corner and mostly motionless with an expression of fear on his face. His mouth is taped shut and his hands and feet appear to be bound with orange electrical tape. 
 
 The 28-minute video is recorded by and focuses mostly on the face of Brittany Covington, who smokes what appears to be a blunt — a cigar emptied and stuffed with marijuana — while narrating some of the action. Liquor bottles appear to be sitting on a windowsill of the sparsely decorated apartment, along with a crumpled bag of chips. 
 
 As the group laughs and music plays in the background, Covington pans from her face to the victim and back. The two men can be seen cutting the victim's shirt with knives, then taking turns punching him and kicking his head. One of the men cuts the victim's hair and scalp with a knife, and the victim's head appears to be bleeding. Later, they pretend to tap ashes in the wound while Covington laughs. 
 
 As the attack continues, someone off camera shouts "F--- Donald Trump" and "F--- white people." About 15 minutes into the video, one of the men says the victim "represents Trump," and threatens to put him in the trunk of a car and "put a brick on the gas." 
 
 A later clip shows the victim kneeling over a toilet while his assailants force his head into the water and order him to drink. 
 
 At one point in the video, Covington can be heard telling the rest of the group that her little sister doesn't "think it's funny." She also expresses mock disappointment in the attention the live feed is getting on Facebook. 
 
 "Y'all ain't even commenting on my s---, man!" she says into the camera. ||||| Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson speaks during a news conference Thursday, Jan. 5, 2017, on the hate crime and other charges filed against four individuals for an attack on a man that was captured... (Associated Press) 
 
 Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson speaks during a news conference Thursday, Jan. 5, 2017, on the hate crime and other charges filed against four individuals for an attack on a man that was captured on a Facebook video. (Antonio Perez/Chicago Tribune via AP) (Associated Press) 
 
 CHICAGO (AP) — The two 18-year-old men had been schoolmates, police say. After meeting at McDonald's, they spent two days together, driving around visiting friends. Then a pretend fight escalated into a brutal beating of one of the men, a mentally disabled teenager, in an attack that stirred racial tensions and outrage after being broadcast on Facebook Live. 
 
 How the white suburban teen ended up beaten by four black people, threatened with a knife and taunted with profanities against white people and President-elect Donald Trump is among the puzzles authorities are still trying to piece together after the four were charged with hate crimes. 
 
 The alleged attackers will make their first court appearance on Friday, a day after they were charged. The four also face charges of kidnapping and battery in connection to the attack, which was captured on cellphone video by one of the assailants and viewed millions of times on social media. 
 
 "This should never have happened," David Boyd, the victim's brother-in-law, said at a brief news conference in suburban Chicago. He said the victim was traumatized but doing as well as could be expected. 
 
 Neal Strom, a family spokesman, told The Associated Press the victim has had "profound emotional and physical disabilities throughout his life." He did not elaborate. 
 
 The uproar over the beating has intensified the glare on Chicago after a bloody year of violent crime and protests against Mayor Rahm Emanuel and a police department that has been accused of brutality and hushing-up wrongdoing. The department has also been the subject of a long civil-rights investigation by the Justice Department, which is expected to report its findings soon. 
 
 The incident also stirred emotions still raw after a nasty presidential election campaign that split the nation. The case heightened political tensions on social media, with some conservatives suggesting it was linked to the Black Lives Matter movement. Police said there was no indication of any connection. 
 
 The cruelty of the attack and the intense social media exposure prompted President Barack Obama to respond, calling it "despicable." 
 
 "I take these things very seriously," he told Chicago's WBBM-TV on Thursday. But he said the incident does not mean that race relations have gotten worse. 
 
 "We see visuals of racial tensions, violence and so forth because of smartphones and the internet and media ... a lot of the problems that have been there a long time," he said. 
 
 Chicago police initially said the youth was singled out because he has "special needs," not because he was white. But authorities later said the charges resulted from both the suspects' use of racial slurs and their references to the victim's disability. 
 
 Cook County prosecutors identified the suspects as Brittany Covington and Tesfaye Cooper, both of Chicago, and Jordan Hill, of suburban Carpentersville. All are 18. A fourth suspect was identified as Covington's 24-year-old sister, Tanishia Covington, also of Chicago. 
 
 Excerpts of the video posted by Chicago media outlets show the victim with his mouth taped shut and slumped in a corner of a room. At least two assailants are seen cutting off his sweatshirt, and others taunt him off camera. The video shows a wound on the top of the man's head. One person pushes the man's head with his or her foot. 
 
 A red band also appears to be around the victim's hands. He was tied up for four to five hours, authorities said. 
 
 The incident began Saturday, Dec. 31, when the victim and alleged assailant Jordan Hill met at a suburban McDonald's to begin what both the victim and his parents believed would be a sleepover, police said. 
 
 Instead, Hill drove the victim around in a stolen van for a couple of days, ending up at a home in Chicago, where two of the other suspects lived, Detective Commander Kevin Duffin said. 
 
 The victim told police what began as playful fighting escalated. A downstairs neighbor who heard noises threatened to call police. When two of the suspects left and kicked down the neighbor's door, the victim escaped. A police officer later spotted the bloodied and obviously disoriented man wandering down a street. 
 
 The victim's parents reported him missing Monday evening, two days after last hearing from him. The police report said the victim's mother knew the first name of her son's friend — Jordan — but wasn't clear on his last name. The report also noted that the victim "does not like telling his parents who he's with." 
 
 The grandmother of Brittany Covington said the granddaughter she raised from infancy is "not this person." 
 
 "I'm so upset, my head is about to bust open," said Priscilla Covington of Chicago. "I don't know if someone influenced her. ... She had her ups and down. (She) was a good person. I'm so confused."
– The 18-year-old victim of a brutal beating broadcast on Facebook Live thought he was going to a sleepover. That's what his parents thought, too, when they dropped him off at a McDonald's in the Chicago suburbs on New Year's Eve to meet up with 18-year-old Jordan Hill, who had been a classmate. The victim and Hill drove around together (in what police say was a van stolen by Hill) visiting friends for two days, with the victim sleeping in the van. On Tuesday, they ended up at a Chicago apartment where sisters Brittany and Tanishia Covington, ages 18 and 24, lived. What would ultimately turn into the shocking beating, broadcast live for 28 minutes and viewed millions of times on social media, started as a "play fight" between the victim and Hill, the Chicago Tribune reports. It escalated, and police say the Covington sisters got angry and tied the victim up. A downstairs neighbor heard noises and threatened to call police; two of the suspects left to allegedly kick down that neighbor's door, allowing the victim to escape, the AP reports. Hill, the Covington sisters, and 18-year-old Tesfaye Cooper were all charged with a hate crime due to racial slurs and comments about the victim's disability they were allegedly heard making on the video. A family spokesperson says the victim has had "profound emotional and physical disabilities throughout his life," and the missing persons report notes that he "does not like telling his parents who he's with" (his mother knew only Jordan Hill's first name, not his last). The suspects, who also face kidnapping, battery, and other charges, are in court Friday.