The head of the county’s homeless agency is calling on law enforcement to investigate the attacks as a hate crime.

At about 5:45 a.m., Miami Police officers responded to reports of a man armed with a stick assaulting people around North Miami Avenue and Northwest Sixth Street. The man, later identified as Brenton Clarke, 36, was arrested after a brief foot chase.

The police said that Brenton Clarke, 36, of Long Island, N.Y., used a metal rod and a wooden stick to attack four homeless people in what they said was an unprovoked assault.

A man has been arrested after an “unprovoked” attack on homeless people in downtown Miami left two dead and two others hospitalized Thursday morning, authorities said. Brenton Clarke, 36, faces two counts of first-degree murder,

A maniac armed with a metal rod and wooden stick allegedly beat two sleeping homeless people to death and injured another homeless couple in an unprovoked pre-dawn rampage in downtown Miami, according to police.

Police officers identified a man accused of attacking a group of homeless people, killing two and injuring two others in Miami.

A man was arrested Thursday and charged with murder after, police say, he attacked homeless people in Miami with a metal rod and a wooden plank with nails in it, killing two and injuring two more.

MIAMI - An arrest has been made in the unprovoked attacks on the homeless in Downtown Miami that left two dead. Brenton Clarke, 36, has been charged with two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of attempted first-degree murder and armed robbery with a deadly weapon.