Story highlights The four are accused of luring Kevin Pennington into a truck 
 
 They then drove him to a park and assaulted him 
 
 The victim fled when they are looking for a tire iron to kill him, prosecutors say 
 
 A court has sentenced four relatives to years in prison for their roles in kidnapping and assaulting a gay man in Kentucky 
 
 The four were accused of luring Kevin Pennington into a truck in April 2011 and driving him up a deserted road into Kingdom Come State Park. 
 
 They pulled him out of the car and assaulted him, and as they were looking for a tire iron to kill him, he escaped, according to prosecutors. 
 
 David J. Jenkins, 39, was sentenced Wednesday to three decades in prison while his 22-year-old cousin, Anthony R. Jenkins, will be locked up for 17 years. 
 
 A jury in London, Kentucky, found the two men guilty of kidnapping and conspiracy, but acquitted both of federal hate crime charges in a major blow to the Justice Department. 
 
 Two female relatives who pleaded guilty to the scheme to kidnap and assault the man -- as well as taking part in a hate crime -- were also sentenced Wednesday. The women were the first to be convicted under the federal sexual orientation provision to the hate crime law. 
 
 Mable A. Jenkins, 20, got eight years and four months in prison, and Alexis L. Jenkins, also 20, was sentenced to eight years. The two women testified against their male relatives. 
 
 Some of the charges against the relatives fell under the Matthew Shepard James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, a federal law that outlaws attacks based on a victim's sexual orientation. 
 
 Federal hate crime law was expanded in 2009 to include a victim's perceived sexual orientation, gender or disability. 
 
 The law was named for Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Both men were attacked and killed in separate incidents in 1998 that drew national attention to the need to toughen hate crime laws. 
 
 Shepard was gay, and Byrd was killed in a racially- motivated attack. He was black. 

 LONDON — In the first case of its kind in the nation, four Eastern Kentucky relatives were sentenced in federal court Wednesday for their role in an attack on a gay Letcher County man in April 2011. 
 
 David Jason Jenkins, 39, was sentenced to 30 years in prison for kidnapping and beating Kevin Pennington. Anthony Jenkins, 22, a cousin to Jason Jenkins, was sentenced to 17 years in federal prison by U.S. District Judge Gregory F. Van Tatenhove. 
 
 Anthony Jenkins' wife, Alexis, and his sister, Ashley, pleaded guilty to aiding in the attack. Van Tatenhove sentenced Alexis Jenkins, 20, to eight years in prison and Ashley Jenkins, 20, to eight years and four months. 
 
 The case received nationwide attention because the charges against the four were the first under a part of the federal hate-crimes law that outlaws attacks motivated by the victim's real or perceived sexual orientation. 
 
 Alexis and Ashley Jenkins became the first people convicted under that provision when they pleaded guilty last year. 
 
 Jason and Anthony Jenkins fought the charges. At a trial last October, jurors convicted the two on conspiracy and kidnapping charges but acquitted them on the hate-crime charge — a setback for the government in the first trial test of the law. 
 
 Ashley and Alexis Jenkins testified for prosecutors, which resulted in shorter sentences. 
 
 The trial was a depressing litany of details about the crippling level of drug abuse in Eastern Kentucky, dysfunctional families and interactions among straight, gay and bisexual people that juror Chuck Owens called "bizarre." 
 
 All the defendants except Anthony Jenkins had serious drug problems; Alexis Jenkins had written poetry about her craving for drugs. The victim, Pennington, was a drug abuser and seller, according to testimony. 
 
 Ashley and Alexis Jenkins said they lured Pennington from his mobile home with a bogus request to help them get Suboxone, a drug used to treat addiction that is widely abused in Eastern Kentucky. 
 
 In reality, Jason and Anthony Jenkins wanted to beat Pennington because he was gay, the women said. 
 
 Pennington said he had seen Jason and Anthony Jenkins attack a gay friend of his earlier, so he wouldn't have gotten into the extended-cab truck if he had known who they were. The men concealed their identities by pulling ball caps low and turning off the dome light in the truck, according to testimony. 
 
 Anthony Jenkins drove to a secluded spot on a mountain in Kingdom Come State Park, in Harlan County, where the two men dragged Pennington from the truck and punched, kicked and stomped him. 
 
 The two young women spurred them on, yelling anti-gay slurs such as "Kill that faggot," according to testimony. 
 
 Pennington said he was able to run into the woods when the men stopped hitting him so they could look for a tire iron in the truck with which to kill him. Pennington hid until the four left, then hobbled to the vacant ranger station in the park, breaking out a window so he could get to a telephone and call 911. 
 
 Pennington suffered bruises, a torn ear, a torn ligament in his shoulder, a closed-head injury and a badly injured ankle. 
 
 Attorneys for Jason and Anthony Jenkins did not dispute that the two assaulted Pennington, but said the attack was motivated by drug and alcohol abuse and anger over an aborted drug deal, not Pennington's sexual orientation. 
 
 Jason Jenkins believed he and the others were on their way to buy drugs, but a concern arose that the seller was a police informant, his attorney, Andrew M. Stephens, said in a court document. 
 
 Jenkins, drunk and stoned, "went redneck" after that and attacked Pennington, "and Anthony followed right behind," Stephens said in the motion. 
 
 Alexis and Ashley Jenkins testified they were bisexual, and Jason Jenkins, even though he was married, allegedly said he wanted to violently rape Pennington before the attack. 
 
 Anthony Jenkins' attorney, Willis Coffey, said earlier that the argument that the four targeted Pennington for being gay made no sense. 
 
 Coffey said earlier that Ashley and Alexis Jenkins lied to get lower sentences. 
 
 Jason Jenkins received the longest sentence in the case in part because of his lengthy criminal history, which included convictions for a robbery in which he cut someone's neck with a knife and another case in which a woman said he beat her with an aluminum baseball bat and raped her. 
 
 Van Tatenhove said Jason Jenkins also drove the conspiracy to attack Pennington.. The judge called Jason Jenkins a violent man from whom the community needs to be protected. 
 
 Anthony Jenkins took part in the same terrible conduct, but the fact that he was 19 at the time; his lack of criminal history; his efforts to hold down a job; and his low intelligence were factors in favor of a lower sentence, Van Tatenhove said. 
 
 An evaluation showed Anthony Jenkins' IQ is in the 96th percentile, meaning 96 of 100 people would score as high or higher. 
 
 Van Tatenhove said Ashley Jenkins bore more responsibility than Alexis Jenkins for what happened to Pennington. Ashley Jenkins was supposedly Pennington's friend, enabling her to lure him from his home. 
 
 Van Tatenhove noted that the people charged in the case had difficult lives: dysfunctional families, relative poverty and parents who were drug abusers. 
 
 All but Anthony Jenkins — who was raised by an aunt and uncle — started abusing drugs as young teens. Anthony and Ashley Jenkins' mother was murdered, likely in a dispute over drugs, and her body was dumped not far from where the two men beat Pennington. 
 
 But difficult lives don't excuse crime, Van Tatenhove said, noting that the law requires people to make good decisions even when it is hard. 
 
 "Just societies choose not to live this way, and to hold accountable those who do," Van Tatenhove said. 
 
 Pennington left the federal courthouse Wednesday without comment after the sentencing. 
 
 U.S. Attorney Kerry B. Harvey, who had spoken briefly with him in the courtroom, said he thought Pennington was satisfied with the sentences. 
 
 Harvey said justice had been done. 
 
 "The sort of brutality and violence that were inflicted on Kevin Pennington just can't be tolerated, and won't be tolerated," Harvey said. 
 
 There is no parole in the federal court system, so the four defendants must serve at least 85 percent of their sentences. It is likely both men will appeal. 
 
 Bill Estep: (606) 678-4655. Twitter: @billestep1 

 Story highlights Women plead guilty to aiding and abetting a kidnapping and hate-crime assault 
 
 They admit to luring a gay man into a pickup 
 
 Two men allegedly waiting in the truck were indicted 
 
 The men have pleaded not guilty to kidnapping and assault 
 
 Two Kentucky women have pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting a kidnapping and hate-crime assault involving a gay man, the Justice Department announced Friday. 
 
 Mable Ashley Jenkins and Alexis LeAnn Jenkins entered guilty pleas Wednesday, according to the Justice Department. The pleas were under seal for two days. 
 
 The two women, both 19, admitted they lured Kevin Pennington into a pickup in April 2011. 
 
 David Jason Jenkins, 37, and Anthony Ray Jenkins, 20, allegedly were waiting in the vehicle and drove Pennington to Kingdom Come State Park in Kentucky and beat him. The two men, who are cousins, pleaded not guilty Thursday to kidnapping and assault charges. 
 
 Alexis Jenkins is married to Anthony Jenkins, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Kentucky. Mable Jenkins is Anthony Jenkins' sister and she is a cousin of David Jenkins. 
 
 The Justice Department said the case marks the first use of the Matthew Shephard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act to bring a case alleging a violation of the sexual orientation provision of the statute. 
 
 Alexis and Mable Jenkins will have a sentencing hearing in August. The charges they admitted to carry a maximum of life. Their plea agreements remain under seal. 
 
 Andrew Stevens, a lawyer for David Jenkins, told CNN Thursday that he believes the two women are cooperating witnesses against David and Anthony Jenkins. 
 
 Stevens expressed concern about the use of the hate crime statute. 
 
 "It's hard to say how you get in someone's head and say this has to do with homosexuality," Stevens said. "It's quite a burden for the government to prove, and I have a suspicion we're in for a fist fight." 
 
 Stevens said his view of the case is that there was "an altercation" about a "drug deal gone bad." 
 
 Anthony Jenkins' lawyer has not returned messages from CNN seeking comment. 
 
 "David Jason Jenkins and Anthony Ray Jenkins made a plan to assault Pennington because of his sexual orientation," according to the indictment against the men. The men wore clothing to try to hide their identities and disabled a light inside the truck to affect Pennington's ability to see, the indictment says. 
 
 The two men are scheduled to stand trial June 18 and if convicted, face a maximum of life in prison. 
 
 Shepherd was a gay teenager who died after being tied to a fence in Wyoming and beaten in 1998. Byrd was an African-American man killed in Texas the same year when he was dragged to death.
– Four relatives were sentenced in federal court yesterday for kidnapping a gay man and attempting to beat him to death in a case that tried out the new federal hate crime provision covering crimes motivated by sexual orientation. Prosecutors say two women convinced Kevin Pennington to get into their truck with a story that they needed his help getting drugs; joined by David Jenkins, 39, and cousin Anthony Jenkins, 22, the four took him into a deserted part of a Kentucky state park. According to testimony, the men attacked him as the women shouted gay slurs; the men were looking for a tire iron to kill him with when Pennington escaped. David and Anthony were both convicted of kidnapping and conspiracy, earning them 30 and 17 years in prison, respectively, but CNN reports that in a major disappointment for the Justice Department, they were both acquitted on the hate crime charges. Attorneys for the men argued the assault had nothing to do with Pennington's sexual orientation, but that the elder Jenkins believed they were en route to a seller who was a police informant, and went ballistic, reports the Herald-Leader. Their cohorts Mable Jenkins (Anthony's sister) and Alexis Jenkins (Anthony's wife) became the first sentenced under the new hate crime provisions, but they pleaded guilty to those charges, as part of a deal to testify against the men. Each got eight years in prison, with Mable getting an additional four months.