Remembering the 16th Street Baptist Church Martyrs: A Special Comment on Religion and Violence
Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, Addie Mae Collins, and Denise McNair. They did not die in vain.
Birmingham, Alabama – Today (September 15) marks the 49th anniversary of the senseless murder of four little girls attending Sunday School at 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama: Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, and Addie Mae Collins who were 14, and Denise McNair who was 12. The church was bombed on September 15, 1963 by a Ku Klux Klan related group in a vain attempt to terrorize the African American community. The nation was stunned by the news, and virtually overnight, these four young innocents became the leading figures in a renewed non-violent Civil Rights movement led by Christian clergy. Non-violent outrage over their deaths, arguably, became the impetus for the greatest achievement of the black liberation movement in the United States: the Voter Rights Act of 1965.
Wesley, Robertson, Collins, and McNair should, of course, be remembered perpetually for the loss of their young lives to race hatred in the great Civil Rights struggle of the 1960s. But this year, their loss, and the response of the African American Christian community to their outrageous murders at the time, is a lesson the world needs most acutely. In the wake of violence throughout the Muslim world over a blasphemous online video defaming the Prophet, and the mounting death toll of American diplomats and Muslim demonstrators, the world needs to pause, take a deep breath, remember the 16th Street children, and choose better ways of protest.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave a movingly personal speech Thursday in the aftermath of attacks on U.S. diplomatic missions in the Middle East, calling on religions of the world to affirm non-violence rather than bloodshed. ABC OTUS News reports that Secretary Clinton, speaking at an Eid ul-Fitr reception marking the end of the Muslim holiday of Ramadan, decried both the “inflammable and despicable” anti-Islamic film circulating on the internet, and the violence that took the lives of four Americans at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya. While all religions inevitably face insults and defamation, she said, the way in which believers choose to respond to these affronts is what separates people of true faith from pretenders who use such events as excuses to lash out with violence. “When Christians are subject to insults to their faith, and that certainly happens, we expect them not to resort to violence. When Hindus or Buddhists are subjected to insults to their faiths, and that also certainly happens, we expect them not to resort to violence,” Clinton said. “The same goes for all faiths, including Islam.”
Speaking out of her own faith as a United Methodist Christian, Secretary Clinton went on to say, “I so strongly believe that the great religions of the world are stronger than any insults. They have withstood offense for centuries. Refraining from violence, then, is not a sign of weakness in one’s faith; it is absolutely the opposite, a sign that one’s faith is unshakable.” Rather than take the path of violence, she said, when one person acts with violence, a million should respond with deeds of religious tolerance and reconciliation. Instead of amplifying hatred, she concluded, each of us must commit ourselves to acts of religious tolerance in our own communities of faith.
Reflecting on the lessons of the 16th Street martyrs, the verdict of history is that only the power of love can conquer senseless hatred–the sort of love typified by the non-violent Southern Christian Leadership Conference in the wake of irrational hate crimes like the murders of four little girls nearly fifty years ago. Hate crimes are brutal teachers, but the precepts they teach can lead toward justice and hope, and away from hatred and fear. The difference is the choices we make and the deeds we do. When confronted with savagery, African American Christians and their allies answered with courage and a greater love–love for what is best in faith, what is best in society, and what is supreme in human experience: the power of reconciliation and hope.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., in his eulogy for the four little girls on September 18, 1963, said to the grieving city of Birmingham:
“These tragic deaths may lead our nation to substitute an aristocracy of character for an aristocracy of color. The spilled blood of these innocent girls may cause the whole citizenry of Birmingham to transform the negative extremes of a dark past into the positive extremes of a bright future. Indeed this tragic event may cause the white South to come to terms with its conscience. And so I stand here to say this afternoon to all assembled here, that in spite of the darkness of this hour, we must not despair. We must not become bitter, nor must we harbor the desire to retaliate with violence. No, we must not lose faith in our white brothers. Somehow we must believe that the most misguided among them can learn to respect the dignity and the worth of all human personality.”
Never has the challenge to true hearts been greater than today. The lessons of our forebears and the martyrs who preceded us point away from fear and violence and toward justice and love. The Unfinished Lives Project Team, then, offers this simple prayer for a better world: “Let there be peace on earth, and let it begin with me.”
Transgender Murder in Cincinnati Part of Alarming National Trend
Kendall L. Hampton, 26, gender variant person killed by gunshots in Cincinnati.
Cincinnati, Ohio – A 26-year-old gender-nonconforming person was found shot to death late last Saturday night. Transgender and anti-violence advocates are drawing attention to the brutal murder of Kendall L. Hampton as they highlight the alarming increase in transgender and gender non-conforming violence in the country, especially against people of color.
Your Black World says that the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs (NCAVP) has identified nine gender non-conforming or transgender homicides this year so far. Of the 30 documented murders of LGBTQ people registered by the NCAVP, 87% are either transgender or gender variant people of color.
WXIX TV 19 reports that Hampton, an alleged sex worker, was found fatally shot in a parking lot between a McDonald’s fast food restaurant and a Dairy Mart. He was transported to nearby University Hospital where he was pronounced dead later that night. Police say that Hampton was shot twice by an unknown assailant.
The NCAVP and the Buckeye Region Anti-Violence Organization are calling on lawmakers and law enforcement officials to investigate Hampton’s murder for signs of gender, race, and sexual orientation bias. An increasing chorus of advocates and everyday citizens is calling for better enforcement of hate crimes statutes, especially the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, signed into law by President Obama in October of 2009. Social Justice activists note that since increased publicity has been focused on LGBTQ people since the Shepard Act became law, the rate of violence has increased each year. Some are calling for the passage of tougher anti-queer legislation to protect the vulnerable LGBTQ community.
Often news reports of prostitution are published by the media in gender variant homicide cases, not because gender non-conforming people are apt to be sex workers, but rather because the sensational titillation associated with the murder of prostitutes sells more copy. The effect of such reports is to downplay the public’s sympathy for the victim, and to lessen the impact of the news of a murder on a wider readership or listening audience. It is a sometimes no-so-subtle means of blaming the victim for his own demise. Whether Kendall Hampton was actively working in the sex industry is beside the point. He was a human being of worth, perceived to be different enough that someone acted out of hatred and killed him. Whether the killer gets to own the story of his victim’s death will be up to a more informed public, and a media establishment less interested in sensationalism and more intent on stopping violence against Americans.
Murdered African American Woman Remains Unidentified–Was She Lesbian?
“Jane Doe,” as rendered by Ellis County’s Sheriff’s Office, along with photos of tattoo markings on her decomposed body.
Ellis County, Texas – The decomposing corpse of an African American woman was discovered in a rural, wooded area of Ellis County on Monday, July 23. Get Equal Texas is organizing a massive campaign to identify her, and to seek out the person or persons who took her life. In a press release dated July 31, Get Equal states on its Facebook page: “She is approximately 5’4 inches tall and weighing approximately 115 pounds. She is believed to be of African-American heritage. She was wearing a black or dark gray tank top, blue jean shorts and white Nike tennis shoes with purple shoe laces. It is believed she may have disappeared on or after the early afternoon of July 17, 2012.” The Ellis County Sheriff’s Office has released a forensic artist’s best guess about the likeness of “Jane Doe,” along with photographs of tattoo markings on her corpse.
Sheriff’s Department Investigator Joe Fitzgerald reported to the Dallas Voice that “Jane Doe” had connections to Dallas and Irving, and was probably a member of the LGBTQ community. Tell-tale trauma evidence on the corpse indicates she was murdered at another location and then brought out to the Ellis County woodlands, a desolate stretch of sparsely populated countryside south of Dallas. “Someone killed her and threw her to the side of the road,” Fitzgerald said. He went on to say that investigators were disturbed that no missing person’s report has described a woman with the characteristics of the deceased.
C.D. Kirven, well-respected activist and member of Get Equal’s Board, said, “If this was a lesbian woman, this makes a third lesbian woman of color brutally attacked in Texas within a month’s time. As a member of the LGBT community and a woman of color, this is not just an attack on this woman but on me and others in my community.”
Examiner.com draws a possible connection with the brutal murder and assault on two lesbian teenagers of Latin descent earlier in the summer on the Texas Gulf Coast. Mollie Olgin, 19, died of a gunshot to the head in a Portland, Texas State Park. Her girlfriend, Mary Kristene Chapa, 18, survived her wounds, and has recently been discharged from hospital to recover and rehabilitate. Noting that police have still arrested no one for the attack on Olgin and Chapa, the Examiner post goes on to speculate: “It very well could be that all three of these violent crimes are related. This is why a warning should go out in the Texas area for it seems that our gay sisters are becoming targets for dangerous individuals whether the police wish to admit to this insight or not.” The post goes on to call upon all members of the LGBTQ community to assist in spreading the artist’s sketch of the Ellis County “Jane Doe” and to warn women to be on their guard for a killer or killers of lesbian women of color still at large in Texas.
“The anonymous nature of this killing demands an all-out effort on the part of the LGBTQ community in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex to recover the identity of this woman whose death is the very definition of an ‘unfinished life,'” said Stephen Sprinkle, Founder and Director of the Unfinished Lives Project, which tells the stories of little known or forgotten LGBTQ hate crimes murder victims.
Officer Fitzgerald asks anyone with information on the identity of the victim or the circumstances of her death to call the Ellis County Sheriff’s Department at 972-825-4928.
Anti-Gay Racism Hits New Low; Pastor Lynches President Obama In Effigy For Supporting Gay Equality
Racism and homophobic bigotry on display in a Florida church’s front yard.
Gainesville, Florida – President Barack Obama hangs in effigy from a gallows with a gay flag in his hand in the front yard of a Florida church in a blatant grab for publicity–but Pastor Terry Jones is flirting with incitement to violence against blacks and gay people. The Smoking Gun blog says that the Obama effigy is also holding a baby doll in its other hand. A trailer emblazoned with the motto, “Obama is Killing America” sits facing the road in front of the Dove World Outreach Center. In an interview with Huffington Post, Jones said that the flag was to protest the President’s support for LGBTQ people, and the doll symbolized Mr. Obama’s position “on abortion.” As USA Today reported, Jones came to international attention for his “Burn a Koran” campaign in 2010 and 2011 which inflamed anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S., imperiled the lives of American service members stationed around the world, and ignited Islamic protests against this nation throughout the world. After Jones oversaw the burning of the Muslim holy book in 2011, three days of riots broke out in Afghanistan, with over 21 homicides including seven dead United Nations workers. Now, seeking the glory days of his past buffoonery, Jones is making a visual statement he says is protected by the First Amendment guaranteeing freedom of speech.
Disavowing the obvious threat implied in the gallows installation, Jones says he only wishes President Obama to “die politically” for what he is “doing to America.” While some constitutional scholars may agree, taking a cue from the 2011 legal victory of Westboro Baptist Church protecting the Topeka, Kansas church’s protests at military service members’ funerals, Jones is hypocritically cloaking his violent symbology in freedom of speech language. Local Floridians are not buying his diversionary tactics, however. WCJB TV-20 interviewed Gainesville neighbor Mary Mamatsios who said of the controversial pastor, “He’s just over the edge and he has nothing better to do. He’s a total screwball.” This view is widely held throughout the Sunshine State.
The extreme violence portrayed by Jones’s church by including a gallows and a hangman’s noose disturbs the peace of African Americans and LGBTQ folk alike. Symbols matter, and the incitement to violence conjured up in the collective consciousness of the black community by the threat of lynching and the noose threatens to cross the legal line. The U.S. Secret Service is not only aware of the controversial installation in the Dove Center’s yard, but are actively investigating Jones and the church for threatening the life and wellbeing of the President, according to the Broward Palm Beach New Times. As Dr. James Cone, pioneer Black theologian, shows in his award-winning book, The Cross and the Lynching Tree (Orbis Books, 2011), nooses and lynching haunt the Black community due to the extermination by lynching of black men throughout the South during the “Strange Fruit” period of the 20th century. Stephen G.Ray Jr. of the Christian Century Magazine says Cone’s book “is a theological meditation on a dimension of the lethal oppression experienced by African Americans that has been formative for both the faith and civic posture of the black community for a very long time.”
But the LGBTQ community also has legitimate concerns about security and safety, too. The suffering of blacks and gay people as marginalized communities runs on parallel tracks in this latest controversy. Since the Matthew Shepard/James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act was signed into law by the President in October 2009, murders of LGBTQ people have risen sharply, this year reaching the highest number of hate crime homicides every seen in the USA. Gays and blacks are targeted by people who believe queer executions are justified by the Bible and the authority of church leadership. Like the African American fear of what a noose represents, the hanging of an effigy holding a rainbow flag in its hand conveys what bigots like Jones surely have in mind for LGBTQ people.
A parable: When a dog owner neglects to secure the pet pen, allowing a snapping dog to run free in the neighborhood, who is to blame if the dog digs up the rose beds, urinates on someone’s shoes and socks, kills two pet cats, and mauls a little girl? The dog? No! It was in the dog’s nature and conditioning to bite and tear. The person who unleashed a dog he knew was likely to bite on the other hand sets up the condition by which injury and death may occur–and the dog owner is legally responsible for the damage his pet causes to life, limb and property. When demagogues like Jones and his more practiced homophobe, Rev. Fred Phelps, breathe out their hatred of LGBTQ people, they are also potentially inciting “whosoever will” to violence against gays, lesbians, bisexual people, and transgender people. The incitement to commit a bias crime is a crime of violence in its own right, as Rev. Dr. Mel White has pointed out time and again–and it has to be stopped.
Another Gay Minnesota Teen Crushed By Weight of Homophobic Bullying
Portrait of gay bullycide victim Jay’Cory Jones, 17, held by his father, JayBoka Strader.
Rochester, Minnesota – A 17-year-old openly gay teen succumbed to overwhelming bullying, taking his own life this past Sunday. Jay’Cory Jones jumped to his death into traffic from a pedestrian bridge near Century High School, according to police reports. According to his father, Jones was beaten down by the incessant school bullying he endured for being open and vocal about his sexual orientation. His father, JayBocka Strader, told the PostBulletin.com, “He said all of his life they always picked on him. He’d still try to keep his head up at school, but then he’d come home and be really sad about it.” Mr. Strader went on to say that his son was depressed because other boys wouldn’t accept him for who he was.
Jones knew of his sexual orientation since he was a little boy. He took pride in who he was, and declared on his Facebook page that he was “Gay & Proud.” A member of the Century Gay Straight Alliance, he sought help with his feelings from the Gay and Lesbian Youth Services in Rochester where he attended weekly meetings. In the end, the pressure on him from his peers was just too much to bear.
ABC 6 News reports that Jones’s high school friends confirm that the abuse he suffered from bullies was a large factor in his death. “You could tell it upset him because like he didn’t understand why people couldn’t accept him for who he was,” his friend Rachel said. “It just sucks that we had to lose somebody because of people’s words, and they didn’t realize that words hurt more than anything else.”
Communities across Minnesota, even the notorious Anoka-Hennepin School District in suburban Minneapolis, as well as towns and cities around the nation are attempting to staunch the numbers of gay and lesbian teens who take their lives because of homophobic bullying. There is help available, like the Gay and Lesbian Youth Services of Rochester, and the nationally based Trevor Helpline, but it appears to be too little too late for so many, like Jay’Cory.
As EDGE On The Net reports, his dad said, “Up until his death, he took a stand. He was like, ’Whatever happens, happens — I’m just going to take a stand.’ And he started to take a stand.” The homophobia in Century High School was just too heavy to win against. To honor Jay’Cory, Mr. Strader requests that people wear pink. “I told him he looked really good in pink,” he said.
The Trevor Project 24-hour Lifeline number is 866-488-7386. For God’s sake, use it!
Dallas Gay Community Rallies for Marriage Equality
Senior Pastor of Cathedral of Hope Dallas, Dr. Jo Hudson and GET EQUAL Texas Regional Director, Daniel Cates speak out for human rights and marriage equality (Dallas Voice photo).
Dallas, Texas – A swiftly gathered crowd of nearly a hundred people converged on the crossroads of the LGBTQ community in Dallas on Wednesday to speak out in support of President Barack Obama who publicly declared his decision to endorse same-sex marriage in the United States. Called together at the Legacy of Love Monument by Daniel Cates, Regional Director of GET EQUAL Texas to protest the victory of the anti-gay marriage amendment to the North Carolina state constitution, events in Washington, D.C. caused Cates to recast the rally in support of President Obama’s endorsement of Marriage Equality for all Americans.
The crowd was a rainbow cross-section of the LGBTQ and Allied community in North Texas: activists and organizers, clergy and lay leaders from churches and synagogues, journalists and television reporters, enthusiastic gays, lesbians, transgender and bisexual people, straight allies, and some plainly curious about what all the flag waving, speeches, and homemade signs were all about. Messages were strong. Cates read the words of slain gay San Franciscan Harvey Milk, to rally the crowd to recruit others to the cause of “100 percent equality” for LGBTQ people. Rev. Dr. Jo Hudson, Senior Pastor at Dallas’s Cathedral of Hope, set the tone for this historic day, declaring that for the first time in history, a sitting United States President has declared his support for same-sex marriage. Dr. Hudson quoted the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., saying today the “long arc of history” had bent a significant distance toward justice.
The Dallas Voice reports that Dallas Stonewall Democrats President Omar Narvaez thanked President Obama, saying he was proud “to say that President Obama has evolved.” Narvaez encouraged the crowd to become politically involved in support of progressive Democratic candidates up and down the slate this November. Rafael McDonnell of the Resource Center of Dallas, called by Cates “the most important and effective rights activist in North Texas,” said that this day was a “rainbow-colored, neon-lighted, star spangled, red letter day” in the struggle for human rights. Dr. Stephen Sprinkle, Professor at Brite Divinity School in Fort Worth and Theologian-in-Residence at Cathedral of Hope, told the cheering rally that President Obama’s public declaration of support was the most powerful reply to the victory of Amendment One in North Carolina that he could imagine. Citing his admiration for the amazing campaign of the NC NAACP to defeat Amendment One in his home state, Sprinkle called upon the crowd to reach out to African Americans, Latinos and Latinas, Asian Americans, women, and other marginalized groups in the nation who are the LGBTQ community’s “natural allies.” “We need to let President Obama know that when the extremist right wing strike out at him, which they surely will, we in the LGBTQ community will have his back!” he declared.
Other speakers, including leadership from Equality Texas, local bloggers, and members of the crowd who had a word to speak, called upon Texans to remember that they have much to do in the Lone Star State to win equality here at home. Dr. Hudson said, “There will come a time when Lesbian couples and Gay couples will marry each other in justice of the peace offices, courthouses, and churches right here in Texas!” As the Dallas Voice reports, “Many [attendees] shared stories of losing loved ones and not having any rights to keep their things or claim their true relationship, while others shared stories of progress in uniting an anti-gay neighborhood and overcoming their own struggles for equality.” The gathering sang the great Civil Rights theme song, “We Shall Overcome,” holding hands as the Dallas traffic sped by.
The news organizations such as the local Fox News affiliate, NBC Channel 5, and CW 33 Dallas/Fort Worth News covered the event with video cameras rolling. Their presence shows the far-reaching significance of the news made by President Obama and the LGBTQ community of North Texas.
Transgender Woman of Color Murdered in Possible Hate Crime
Brandy Martell, 37, transgender woman shot to death in Downtown Oakland.
Oakland, California – As 37-year-old transgender woman Brandy Martell sat behind the wheel of her car early Sunday morning, the men who were talking with her shot her to death. ABC7 reports that two other women in the car with Ms. Martell say the two men who attacked her had approached the car for a conversation. The witnesses told News 7 that the conversation turned angry, and one of the men drew his weapon and shot into the car.
Many in the East Bay progressive community say that the murder was an anti-transgender hate crime. Oakland Occupy Patriarchy, and affiliate of Occupy Oakland, reports that the killer had “become enraged and shot her when he realized she was trans.” A vigil in memory of Ms. Martell was held Sunday night for her grief-stricken friends and the Oakland transgender and transsexual community. SF Weekly reports that one attendee, Holly Fogelbach, expressed the feelings at the vigil in an email message. “This morning,” she wrote, “I can’t shake the pain of what I saw, not for me but for that family and for those friends and for the people who make their living on those corners and will be out there again tonight while Brandi’s [sic] blood is still drying on the pavement.”
Ms. Martell recently worked as an outreach worker for the Tri-City Health Center in Fremont, an agency specializing in assistance to members of the gender variant community. She and her friends were out on the town, having a good time together when the savage attack occurred, according to ABC 7. One of the occupants of the car who declined to be identified because the killer and his accomplice are not yet in custody, strongly refuted any suggestion that Ms. Martell and her friends were “engaged in the sex trade” or were doing anything other than enjoying each other’s company in Downtown Oakland. “Everyone who is out late is not doing something wrong, you know,” she said. Another friend of Ms. Martell, Tiffany Woods, said, “When you don’t provide a space in society for people who you think are the other or different, especially transgender women, especially transgender women of color, when you don’t provide spaces for them to be in a safe environment or a safe space, whether it’s socializing or services, this is what happens.”
Police are not yet investigating this case as a hate crime. No one has been arrested and charged for the shooting as of this writing. Because of the slow pace of mainstream media coverage of this story, many in the transgender community of the East Bay are left feeling “nobody cares.”
Transgender Woman of Color Murdered in Chicago
Paige Clay, transgender woman shot to death in Chicago (Brian Turner photo)
Chicago, Illinois – A young transgender woman of color was found shot in the head in the West Garfield Park area of Chicago. Paige Clay, 23, was found dead in an alley in the early morning hours of April 16, according to the Windy City Times. No one has been arrested in connection with her murder. Police are still actively investigating the brutal shooting.
Members of the Chicago LGBTQ support community and participants in the Chicago Ball scene who knew and loved Ms. Clay identified the body for authorities. Mina Ross, Ms. Clay’s “ball mother” deeply mourns her protegé’s passing. Ms. Ross describes Ms. Clay as “rambunctious,” beautiful, hard to get to know at first, but a strongly loyal friend to those who took the time to get behind Ms. Clay’s self-protective exterior. Ms. Ross told reporters that Ms. Clay was just beginning to find herself. “She grew into a beautiful, beautiful young woman,” Ms. Ross said. “I was so devastated by this [loss] .”
Ms. Clay was becoming a significant presence on the Chicago Ball scene, where her runway work, her innovative sense of style and fashion, and her charismatic persona were winning her friends and winning competitions. She had even begun to win out-of-state competitions, according to Ms. Ross. But she was also targeted by discrimination and violence according to her friends, as are so many transgender women of color in the Windy City and around the nation.
She had grown up in tough circumstances with little family support. At an early age, Ms. Clay had found LGBTQ support services, and was a well-known client for many years. In recent years, she had found steady jobs with McDonald’s and Wendy’s restaurants, as well as Fashion 21. She had managed to secure her own apartment, a matter of considerable pride for her. Most importantly, she had attracted a large queer family of choice, one that is coming to her defense in the press, and clamoring for police action to solve her savage murder. Since few family members remained in touch with Ms. Clay, friends and ball scene associates stepped in to stand vigil over her memory while officials searched for next-of-kin to receive her remains. Funeral arrangements are pending.
The Center on Halsted, where Ms. Clay had become a familiar presence through the years, issued a statement to the press concerning her murder, according to the Examiner. Chief Executive Officer of the Center, Modesto Tico Valle, said, “Though we do not have all the details, this news is extremely disturbing, especially as severe violence against transgender women is all too common. Transgender women face some of the highest rates of violence and abuse in our nation. This is the third reported murder of a transgender woman in the U.S. in April alone. We must work together to create more safety in our world for all people, especially those most targeted.”
A “Justice for Paige” Facebook site has been opened for the express purpose of gathering information on the murder, and to insure that “ANOTHER ONE OF OURS JUST WON’ T BE SWEPT UNDER THE RUG,” as the site creators say.
Gay Bashing Targets Two North Carolina Women
Sarabeth Nordstrom and Erin Johnston, brutally attacked by homophobes in Boone, North Carolina (Q Notes image)
Boone, North Carolina – Two women perceived to be lesbians were targeted by anti-gay violence at a fast food restaurant in Boone, North Carolina. Sarabeth Nordstrom and Erin Johnston, a junior exercise science major at Appalachian State University, were verbally harassed with anti-lesbian slurs at the restaurant on February 11 by two females and a male, according to Q Notes. When Nordstrom and Johnston left for home, the lone male and one of the female harassers followed them. According to Equality North Carolina, the male initiated the attack upon the women at approximately 2:30 a.m. in the parking lot of the apartment complex where the victims lived. Nordstrom was struck in the face repeatedly, sustaining a broken nose, eye socket, and cheekbone. Johnston was knocked to the ground when she tried to call 911 for help, and stomped again and again. Her ribs were broken, her meniscus was torn, and she suffered wounds to her mouth and her nasal cartilage. They were treated at Watauga Medical Center and released.
The victims said they had never met their assailants prior to the incident. The alleged main attacker, Ketoine Jamahl Mitchell, 19, turned himself into Boone Police, and was charged with two counts of assault on a woman, one count of assault inflicting serious injury, and one count of assault with a deadly weapon. Brooklyn Lacrossa Canter, 18, was arrested in early March, and charged with aiding and abetting the assault. Mitchell, who has a larceny record in Caldwell County, is being held in the Watauga Detention Center on a $6,000 secure bond, according to The Appalachian Online. Authorities have set April 17 for the first court appearance of Mitchell and Canter.
As Equality North Carolina points out, there is no hate crimes protection for lesbians, gay men, bisexual people, and transgender people in the state law codes. Since this savage attack, ENC has agitated for the passage of the Safer Communities Act by the NC State Legislature, which specifies LGBT people as a protected class from physical harm. Since anti-gay slurs were shouted by the assailants at the victims during the harassment and attack, by definition this was a hate crime–one law enforcement authorities in North Carolina are not yet equipped to acknowledge or combat.
The Appalachian State community has rallied to the support of the victims. On March 2, a University Forum addressed the question of violence against gay people and women, and on March 5 a benefit was held to give the women a hand with their expenses since the attack. A petition to Governor Bev Perdue and the state legislature to amend the NC hate crimes statutes is collecting signatures on Change.org, and can be accessed here. A Facebook page has been created in support of the petition.
Gay University Student Attacked, Raped, Barely Escapes with His Life
Keire Gartica, 25, Gay Hate Crime victim, recovering from his wounds.
Corpus Christi, Texas – A gay university student says he was captured, beaten for hours, raped, and would surely have died if he had not escaped his assailants through a window. Keire Gartica, 25, a Texas A&M Corpus Christi Political Science student, was found naked and bleeding from multiple wounds on Thursday after his harrowing escape. The police took him to a hospital where he was treated and released. Gartica says his attackers, two Hispanic men in their 20s or 30s, held him hostage and repeatedly assaulted him, calling him racial and homophobic slurs, after he came by their house on Elizabeth Street to repay a $5 debt he owed them.
KRIS TV News reports that police are treating the investigation as a simple assault until the District Attorney makes a determination on hate crimes charges. Gartica, in the meanwhile, has left Corpus Christi for his home in another locale to recover from his wounds. According to his Facebook page, authorities are “dragging their feet,” and police have not yet interviewed him about the heinous hate crime which took place almost a week ago. On Sunday, Gartica posted: “I was the victim of a heinous hate crime that has rendered me a shell of myself. Action ten news in Corpus is covering the story and I conducted an extended interview that airs tonight at ten. There is also footage of me immediately after my escape thursday night on the action ten site… the people responsible for this will be held accountable and brought to justice.”
The attack was prolonged and brutal. Gartica told KZTV 10 reporters that he was forced to clean the house naked by his assailants, who beat him with a belt buckle, glass cups, a frying pan, a pistol, and their fists while he complied in fear of his life. At one point, an attacker threw bleach in his eyes, blinding him. The men debased him racially, and violated him sexually with a variety of items. Gartica is certain he would not be alive today if he had not taken a chance and jumped out of a window.
Now Gartica, shaken by his ordeal, has lost his sense of security. He says he will not feel safe again until his attackers are apprehended and are behind bars. As he said in a telephone interview for Six News, “I don’t feel right at all. It’s hard to fathom that this actually happened. It doesn’t seem like this actually happened.” Though Gartica is appreciative of the outpouring of support for him by friends and classmates all over the state of Texas, he posted on his Facebook page,“It has been almost a week. I just feel powerless.”
About
If you are a first-time visitor to the Unfinished Lives Project website, we invite you to read A Welcome Message introducing you to our project. We are truly grateful for your visit.
The Unfinished Lives Project website is a place of public discourse which remembers and honors LGBTQ hate crime victims, while also revealing the reality of unseen violence perpetrated against people whose only “offense” is their sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender presentation. LGBTQ people in the United States are suffering a slow-rolling decimation of terror and murder all across the country. Every locale and demographic of society are affected: First Nations, Anglo, Black, Latino and Latina, South and Southeast Asian, Transgender, Bisexuals, Gay men, Lesbians, disabled, young, and mature. Homophobia has a long, crooked arm, and it is reaching out to snatch the life away from women and men whose tragic stories are under-reported to begin with, and whose memories are swiftly forgotten.
The horror of these killings transcends the shock and bereavement of loved ones and friends. These are not typical homicides; they are not killings for money or drugs, incidents of domestic strife, or crimes of passion. The vicious nature of hate crimes against LGBTQ persons is extremely brutal, grotesquely violent, and egregiously hateful.
Each murder serves the LGBTQ population as a sobering warning about the actual level of danger in our communities. The message these killings send is that freedom and open life for LGBTQ people is a cruel dream. Every time we remember one of these victims, however, the intentions of their killers are frustrated. To remember these women and men is to begin the process of changing the culture that killed them.
Our Project Director
Dr. Stephen V. Sprinkle (Keith Tew photo).
Stephen V. Sprinkle is Director of Field Education and Supervised Ministry, and Professor of Practical Theology at Brite Divinity School, Fort Worth, Texas, a post he has held since 1994. An ordained Baptist minister, he is the first open and out Gay scholar in the history of the Divinity School, and the first open and out LGBTQ person to be tenured there. Read More…
Recent Social Justice Advocacy Activity By Dr. Sprinkle
Summer 2009 – Dr. Sprinkle responded to the Fort Worth Police Department and Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission Raid on the Rainbow Lounge, Fort Worth’s newest gay bar, on June 28, 2009, the exact 40th Anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion. Dr. Sprinkle was invited to speak at three protest events sponsored by Queer LiberAction of Dallas. Here, he is keynoting the Rainbow Lounge Protest at the Tarrant County Courthouse on July 12, 2009. Read More…
Contact Us
Communicate with the Unfinished Lives project team:
info@unfinishedlivesblog.com
Schedule a Presentation
Dr. Sprinkle will gladly present his acclaimed presentation to your organization. To arrange an Unfinished Lives presentation for your organization or group, please contact us.
Dr. Sprinkle has given his Unfinished Lives presentation to these and other community groups and organizations. Read More…
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Where are our readers?
Publisher: Steve Sprinkle (Project Director)
Steve Sprinkle
Unfinished Lives: Remembering LGBT Hate Crime VictimsBrite Divinity School/Texas Christian UniversityFort Worth TXprofessor, minister, author, blogger, LGBTQ advocate
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