The Staten Island Advance posted this morning that a verdict for John Alla, who was charged with bias crimes after he shouted homophobic slurs at and knocked the hats off of two women at Staten Island’s first pride parade in 2005, may be announced today. Alla faces up to a year in prison if he is found guilty of two counts of aggravated harassment as a bias crime (the most serious charges against him).

    After a week-long trial, a jury of six deliberated for almost five hours yesterday, arriving at a deadlock on two of the five charges, which also included two counts of harassment and a disorderly persons charge.
    The panel is expected to continue deliberation today.
    Before the trial began, Alla — a Muslim of Albanian descent — reportedly denied hitting the women and shouting the slurs, saying that he only pulled feathers off their hats because they hit him in the back with a marching stick. He contended he had no idea the parade was to celebrate gay and lesbian pride.

I’m assuming that deliberation did not come to an end today (I haven’t found any verdict news). If you have updated information, please share.