The wounds money can't heal: a Colorado teen wins a million dollars in damages after an alleged attack--but local police still doubt his story. (People).

Friends and family detect a difference in Kyle Skyock. They say the teenager has changed since February 11, 2001, when a jogger found him facedown, unconscious, and bloody under a city limits sign on the eastern edge of Rifle, Colo., population 6,784.

Skyock's father says his son is less trusting. Skyock's friends say he acts more macho. Skyock's legal advocate, Mike Brewer, says the youth is "much more jumpy."

Skyock, at 5 foot 4 and a slight 125 pounds, says, "I'm still scared. I should be more comfortable around people than I am."

Skyock, now 18, says that on February 10, 2001, four teenagers from Rifle beat him up because he's gay. And more than two years later, on March 13, a federal judge ruled that Skyock's civil rights had been violated and awarded him $1.22 million in damages.

In the Denver courtroom Skyock sat next to his mother and father and was surrounded by gay and lesbian supporters, including Brewer, who works for the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Community Center of Colorado.

That February night, Skyock told the judge, he had finished his shift at the Rifle Elks Lodge, where he worked in the kitchen, and left with an acquaintance, who then invited him to a house party.,"I went with a boy I thought was my friend and ended up getting almost killed," he said.

Skyock remembers leaving the party with four other boys in a truck headed for the highway. He remembers the driver making a call on a cell phone, a pungent smell like fingernail polish, and then being pulled from the truck. He remembers being kicked and pummeled with a baseball bat and a 2-by-4. He remembers "being called a faggot."

A jogger found Skyock about seven hours later at the bottom of a steep embankment along U.S. Highway 6.

Skyock had suffered a fractured skull, three broken ribs, bruises and scrapes, a puncture wound on his thigh, and an apparent bum on his shoulder. He was airlifted from Rifle to Grand Junction, Colo. While in the hospital, he came out to his family. "I was so scared," he says. "When I got beat up, it kicked me out of the closet. I thought my family would hate that I was gay. But they hated that I was beaten because of it. They fought for me. They went to court for me."

Last month's court hearing was to determine how much two of the boys accused in the attack--brothers Bill and Brian June--and their mother, Jane Jennings, would pay in damages. The brothers and their mother did not respond to the lawsuit, so the hearing included only Skyock's unchallenged testimony. The two other teenagers accused in the attack, brothers Canyon Case and Forest Magnus, and their father, Gary Case, reached an earlier $11,000 settlement with Skyock. "We don't expect to collect much more than a very small fraction," Brewer says.

"But it was a moral victory," Skyock adds. "And I do feel some closure. But still I'm not happy. It's just wrong that I had to go to civil court. But I wanted justice. I needed justice."

Skyock says he'd rather have his day in criminal court. But that's not likely to happen because authorities doubt his story. Although medical experts assert that Skyock suffered his injuries in an assault, both the Rifle police department and a forensic pathologist who examined him think Skyock, who was legally intoxicated that night, probably sustained his injuries in a fall. "Even though I was not guilty of anything, I felt guilty," Skyock says. "I did nothing wrong, but it felt like I was being punished."

Brewer, who says he has evidence proving that the attack was premeditated, says he has never doubted Skyock. "There were several goals in filing the civil suit," he says. "One was to send a message to law enforcement in the state of Colorado that they cannot merely sweep this kind of violence under the rug. And one was to hold the perpetrators accountable in some way."

Skyock, who graduated from high school this year and will go on to beauty school, still lives in Rifle. "It's a good town," he says. And every day he drives along U.S. Highway 6 past the city limits sign where he was found. "But," he says, "I try not to look."

Neff is managing editor of the Chicago Free Press.