Unfinished Lives

Remembering LGBT Hate Crime Victims

Ryan Skipper’s Family Issues Press Release After Conviction of Son’s Killer

Pat Mulder

Pat Mulder embraces a supporter

Bartow, FL – In an email blast send to supporters of the Ryan Skipper Fund and Foundation this evening, news of the reaction of Lynn and Pat Mulder to the guilty verdict for William D. “Bill Bill” Brown went nationwide.  Brown was found guilty of first degree murder and burglary with a deadly weapon by the Polk County jury.  He had previously pled guilty to arson and evidence tampering.  In view of the gravity of the verdict, a heavy sentence, probably life in prison with no possibility of parole, is expected when Judge Hunter rules in early December.  Speaking to the press and to dozens of supporters outside the Polk County Courthouse, the Mulders said, “We would like to thank the State Attorney’s Office and especially Mr. [Cass] Castillo for consistently striving to uncover the truth and seek justice for our family and for Ryan. We want to thank the detectives of the Polk County Sheriff’s Office who worked diligently and showed compassion to our family. Thank you to the crime scene technicians whose attention to detail helped uncover the truth. And thank you to everyone else along the way who committed their time and talent to ensuring that justice was served. Lastly, we thank the jurors who have taken time from their jobs and families to fulfill an important civic duty. You paid attention to testimony that was brought before you and rendered a conclusion that serves justice and benefits society.  To the public, we want you to know that Ryan, like so many gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people, was a good and upstanding member of this community. We all deserve to be judged by our abilities and character instead of our differences. We are all human beings and we all deserve the right to pursue happiness, to have a job, to be parents either naturally or by adoption, to be in a committed loving relationship which is legally recognized, to serve our country in the military openly and honestly with pride. Finally we want the public to know the devastation hate crimes inflict is not only on the individual victim but their families, friends and the entire community feels the impact.  We will always cherish our memories of Ryan. We along with countless others will continue to honor Ryan by always standing up for truth, honesty and equality for all!” Brian Winfield of Equality Florida made this statement in response to the news of Brown’s conviction for Skipper’s murder, “Today’s verdict concludes the final trial of Ryan’s two attackers.  But it does not end the epidemic of anti-gay hate violence in Florida.  Ryan was killed because he was a gay man who lived his life honestly.  During the trials, witnesses revealed that Ryan’s murderers bragged about what they had done and ‘felt that they were doing the world a favor by getting rid of,’ their words ‘one more faggot.’”  Winfield went on to say that hate violence perpetrated against LGBT people in Florida had increased 33% each year for three of the last four years.  He concluded, “The violence Ryan suffered is the most extreme expression of an all too common sentiment – that gay and transgender people are less valued.  The silence of elected officials and even the media in the face of these violent attacks must end.  Gone are the days of blaming the victim for his own murder.”  No one from Brown’s family was present to support him in court today.

Ryan Skipper's gravestone

November 4, 2009 Posted by | Anglo Americans, anti-LGBT hate crime murder, Blame the victim, Florida, gay men, gay panic defense, Hate Crime Statistics, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Law and Order, Media Issues, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Politics, Slurs and epithets, Social Justice Advocacy | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Guilty!: Second Defendant in Ryan Skipper Hate Murder Case

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William D. Brown on the way to jail

Bartow, FL – William D. “Bill Bill” Brown has been found guilty of first degree murder and burglary with a deadly weapon today by a jury in the Polk County, FL, county seat.  Skipper was slashed and stabbed to death in March of 2007 on a lonely, rural road in Wahneta, FL.  A woman who discovered his body beside the road ditch said that it seemed to her that someone had turned on “a sprinkler of blood.”  The 25-year-old college student had been stabbed with knives 19 times, according to the Polk County Medical Examiners Office, causing him to die of blood loss and trauma.  His murderers attempted to fence his automobile after trying in vain to remove blood from the interior of the vehicle.  Unable to find a buyer, they set the car afire at a boat ramp in Auburndale, but frustrated their own attempt by shutting the doors after kindling the blaze.  In a personal communication Lynn Mulder, Ryan Skipper’s step father, said, “William Brown was convicted today of first degree murder, burglary with a deadly weapon and he confessed his guilt in arson and tampering with evidence. Responsibility and accountability has been established and protection for society will occur on 1 Dec when he will be sentenced to life in prison without parole.”  More will be forthcoming from Ryan’s parents and friends as statements to the press outside the Bartow Courthouse become public.  Brown, who elected not to testify in the trial, contended in a pre-trial confession in 2007 that he had “blacked out” and could not remember if or how Ryan Skipper died.  Witnesses reported that he and his accomplice, Joseph “Smiley” Bearden, said they wanted “to rid the world of one more faggot.”  The Skipper case suffered in the media because of the irresponsibility of Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd, who merely repeated the defendants’ unsupported allegations concerning Skipper’s character and activities.  Judd prejudiced the media against Skipper, painting the victim as a person who in some way deserved his fate.  Though each unsupported claim made by the Sheriff’s Department has been systematically debunked, and the public communications director for the county has declared Skipper guiltless of any wrongdoing in any of these particulars, Sheriff Judd himself has never explained or apologized to the public or to Skipper’s parents and friends.  In February of this year, Bearden was found guilty on all counts, and was sentenced to life without parole.  As Mulder has suggested, Brown’s sentence is expected to be similar.  For further information and developments in this case, see the Ryan Skipper Documentary web site, and One Orlando.

November 3, 2009 Posted by | Anglo Americans, anti-LGBT hate crime murder, Blame the victim, Florida, gay men, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Law and Order, Media Issues, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Politics, Slurs and epithets, stabbings | , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Guilty!: Second Defendant in Ryan Skipper Hate Murder Case

Georgetown U’s Second Bias-Related Attack

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Washington, D.C. – According to Vox Populi, Georgetown’s most widely read blog, in the wee hours of November 1, a second anti-LGBT assault took place near the Georgetown University campus.  The university’s Department of Public Safety issued this Public Service Announcement concerning the attack: “Incident summary: On November 1, 2009 at 1:32 a.m., witnesses reported to DPS an assault on a student by an unknown male in the area of 36th & N Streets, NW. Prior to the physical assault, the suspect asked the victim several times, “Are you a homo?”  On November 1, 2009 at approximately 1:32 a.m., witnesses reported to DPS that a student walking in the area of 36th & N Streets, NW was assaulted by an unknown male. Immediately prior to the assault, the suspect asked the victim several times, “Are you a homo?” The suspect fled the scene after physically assaulting the victim.  DPS and GERMS responded to the scene. GERMS transported the victim to Georgetown University Hospital for treatment of the injuries sustained in the assault. DPS gathered information from witnesses and notified MPD. The investigation is ongoing.  Victim(s):The victim suffered injuries in the assault that were treated by GERMS and in the hospital emergency room.  Victim(s) status:GERMS responded to the scene and transported the victim to Georgetown University Hospital where the victim was treated and released. Appropriate University resources are being offered to the victim.  Witness description of suspect(s):The suspect is described as a white male, 6’2″ tall, with red and white face paint, wearing a black leather jacket. (This description was updated on November 2, 2009 at 1:00 p.m. to reflect a witnesses description that included an estimated height.)”  End of PSA.  Last week’s assault involved a woman perceived to be lesbian by her assailants on October 27. This second assault on a student assumed to be LGBT took place in spite of a rally decrying anti-gay violence on the campus by the LGBTQ Center and GU Pride, the LGBTQ advocacy organization, on Friday of last week.

November 3, 2009 Posted by | Anglo Americans, Beatings and battery, harassment, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Law and Order, Lesbian women, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Protests and Demonstrations, Slurs and epithets, Social Justice Advocacy, Unsolved LGBT Crimes, Washington, D.C., women | , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Georgetown U’s Second Bias-Related Attack

Student at Georgetown U Attacked Because of Sexual Orientation

georgetownWashington, D.C. – The Washington Post reports that a female student was assaulted and robbed allegedly because of her sexual orientation on Tuesday, October 27 while she was walking near the entrance to Georgetown University on Canal Road.  Her assailants yelled anti-gay slurs as they beat her, knocked her down, and robbed her of her book bag.  At the time of the attack, she was wearing a T-shirt bearing a gay rights slogan.  Reaction at GU was swift.  By Friday, 50 students protested the assault, showing their support for the woman who was targeted because of her perceived sexual orientation.  JM Alatis, a freshman who serves as historian and secretary of GU Pride, the campus LGBT rights organization, condemned the violence, “We should not have to fear for our lives when we walk down the street.”  The rally had been set in motion by Facebook and Twitter contacts in less than 24 hours, demonstrating the speed with which the linked-in community can respond to anti-LGBT violence.  Students say that intimidation and attacks like this are common in the GU neighborhood, on and off campus.  Speaking to WaPo reporters, sophomore Marcus Brazill said, “This stuff happens all the time, but a lot of us are afraid of reporting it.”  A Georgetown Med student was intimidated by homophobes with a broken glass bottle last fall, and in September 2007, a sophomore student was arrested in an incident that was considered a possible anti-LGBT hate crime.  The case was subsequently dropped according the WaPo, but the controversy led to the establishment of the first LGBTQ Resource Center on the campus of a Roman Catholic/Jesuit university in the nation.  Rev. Kelly O’Brien, S.J., Executive Director of Campus Ministry, commenting on the significance of the LGBTQ Center, said, “Campus Ministry is pleased to collaborate with the LGBTQ Resource Center to learn from and support Georgetown’s LGBTQ community. The Center helps us understand the issues, struggles, concerns, and hopes of the LGBTQ community so that we can better minister to those seeking our care.”  As of Friday, the assailants in this latest anti-LGBT attack were still at large.

October 31, 2009 Posted by | Beatings and battery, harassment, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Law and Order, Lesbian women, Mistaken as LGBT, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Protests and Demonstrations, Slurs and epithets, Social Justice Advocacy, Washington, D.C., women | Comments Off on Student at Georgetown U Attacked Because of Sexual Orientation

Sean Kennedy: Travesty of Justice Could Have Come Out Differently If Shepard Act Had Been In Place

 

Sean & Blue tie

Sean William Kennedy, 20

Washington, DC – Elke Kennedy and her husband, James Parker, were invited by the Human Rights Campaign to represent their slain gay son, Sean William Kennedy, at the ceremonies marking the enactment of the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Law at the White House.  In a statement issued on Sean’s Last Wish, web site for the foundation established following the brutal murder of their son, the Greenville, South Carolina couple issued this statement:  “Elke and Jim are honored to represent the LGBT community in memory of their son Sean Kennedy, who was the victim of a hate crime on May 16, 2007 in Greenville, SC. Sean’s Last Wish foundation considers this a privilege to be the voice and represent the LGBT community as we continue to fight against hatred, bullying, violence and religious bigotry.”  In one of the most egregious abuses of justice in recent years, Sean Kennedy’s murderer, Stephen Moller, was indicted only for involuntary manslaughter and sentenced on June 11 2008 to a 5 year sentence suspended to three years, and received credit for the 199 days he served in county lock-up. He was supposed to stay in prison till September 7, 2009, but received 2 month credit for good behaviour by getting his GED while in prison.  The court was sympathetic to Moller because he had fathered a child who was born while he was serving his shortened sentence, and released him a week earlier than his abridged sentence even called for.  Had there been a Matthew Shepard Act on the books at the time of the Moller trial, federal officials could have intervened, investigated the murder as the anti-LGBT hate crime it was, and tried the defendant under a hate crime charge of murder.  South Carolina, however, never has enacted an anti-LGBT hate crimes prevention law, which coupled with local anti-gay attitudes, caused the breach of justice in the Sean Kennedy case.  Now, thanks to the lobbying of bereaved families like Sean’s, hate crimes against gay people have a fighting chance of being tried and punished in their true context.

October 29, 2009 Posted by | Anglo Americans, anti-LGBT hate crime murder, Beatings and battery, gay men, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Law and Order, Legislation, Matthew Shepard Act, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Social Justice Advocacy, South Carolina, Washington, D.C. | , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Sean Kennedy: Travesty of Justice Could Have Come Out Differently If Shepard Act Had Been In Place

Second Alleged Killer of Ryan Keith Skipper on Trial in Florida

 

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William D. "Bill Bill" Brown on trial

Bartow, FL – Entering its third day, the felony murder trial of William D. “Bill Bill” Brown, 23, is underway in the Polk County, Florida Courthouse.  Brown is the second alleged murderer of Ryan Keith Skipper, a 25-year-old gay college student, who died of 19 stab and slash wounds on a desolate road in Wahneta, Florida in March 2007.  The first trial, that is Joseph “Smiley” Bearden, in February of this year ended with his conviction on all counts and a life sentence in state prison.  Ironically, Skipper’s murder is not being tried as a hate crime, though many including his parents, Lynn and Pat Mulder of Auburndale, contend that their son’s assailants chose him because he was a gay man.  The same judge and prosecutor who tried the Bearden case are trying the Brown case, as well.  In a surprise move by the defense on October 26, Brown pleaded guilty to arson (setting fire to Skipper’s car to destroy evidence), and evidence tampering, which could earn him a total of 20 years at sentencing.  He is still on trial for robbery and first degree murder, which could sentence him to life in prison, just like his accomplice.  The Mulders came to Bartow to attend the Brown trial two days after the wedding of Ryan’s older brother, Damien.  Though they were personally invited to attend the October 28 signing of the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act by President Obama in Washington, DC, a law they had vigorously lobbied to see enacted, the Mulders declined the invitation in order to be present for the trial in Polk County.  Their son Damien and his wife attended the ceremony at the White House in their stead, and were greeted by President Obama, along with Matthew Shepard’s parents, Judy and Dennis, and William Sean Kennedy’s mother, Elke Kennedy.  In communication with the Unfinished Lives Project, Lynn Mulder said that during the first days of the trial, Cass Casstillo, the prosecuting attorney, presented evidence conclusively linking Brown to the murder, including finger prints, shoe impressions, and testimony from others who heard him admit to “stabbing someone.”   Brown has contended that Skipper, whom he knew was gay, touched his “private parts,” irritating him, but denied that he killed his 25-year-old neighbor, who lived barely two blocks from his trailer home in rural Wahneta.  On Wednesday, the prosecution rested.  The Judge gave the jury the next two days off, telling them according to Mulder that the defense would present a short case with one or no witnesses on Monday, such that closing arguments would probably be offered then, and the case would go to the jury on Tuesday, November 3.  Vicki Nantz, lesbian activist from Orlando, and director/co-producer of the acclaimed Ryan Skipper Documentary, Accessory to Murder: Our Culture’s Complicity in the Death of Ryan Skipper, noted to reporters that had there been a Matthew Shepard Law on the books, Skipper’s murder could have been tried as the anti-gay hate crime it was, instead of burying the true motive of the slaying.  Nantz and others have provided a detailed trial summary day-bay-day with links to media reports at the Ryan Skipper Documentary site.  Speaking to the press, Ryan’s mother, Pat, said she wanted it known that her son “was killed by hate.”  She urged the public to help end such lethal hate, because if it were not ended, hatred would kill others.  His father, Lynn, said that Ryan would have approveof the new law protecting LGBT people from hate crimes.  “He would see the value in that,” Mulder said,”that everybody was protected equally under the law, and he would be very proud that the bill was signed into law.”

Ryan and Damien Skipper

Ryan and his brother, Damien Skipper

 

 

 

 

 

October 29, 2009 Posted by | Anglo Americans, anti-LGBT hate crime murder, Blame the victim, Florida, gay men, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Law and Order, Legislation, Matthew Shepard Act, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Social Justice Advocacy, South Carolina, stabbings, Washington, D.C., Wyoming | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Second Alleged Killer of Ryan Keith Skipper on Trial in Florida

Vicious Queens, NY Attack Highlights Need for a Federal Hate Crimes Law

Jack Price speaks from his hospital bed (NY Daily News photo).

Jack Price speaks from his hospital bed (NY Daily News photo).

Queens, NY – Two attackers beat a 49-year-old gay man within an inch of his life in the early morning hours of Friday October 8 near a 24-hour delicatessen where he had stopped to buy a pack of cigarettes.  Jack Price, described by friends as a likable man who went out of his way to help members of the community, was assaulted in the middle of the street in full view of the deli’s surveillance camera.  Two neighborhood men who allegedly carried out what authorities are calling a hate crime attack, Daniel Rodriguez, 21, and Daniel Aleman, 26, were identified by investigators from a close review of the surveillance video, punching, stomping, kicking, and slapping the victim.  Aleman was taken into custody and arraigned on October 11, and Rodriguez, who fled the state, was arrested in Norfolk, VA on October 13.  Both men are charged with felony hate crime assault.  The victim, who fought for his life in ICU at New York Queens Hospital, suffered a broken jaw, fractured ribs, a lacerated spleen and a collapsed lung in the beating.  He recovered enough to describe the crime scenario to reporters for the New York Daily News from his hospital bed.  As he was on his way home, Price said, he saw Rodriguez and Aleman, both of whom he recognized from the College Point Queens neighborhood, approaching him.  In Spanish, the two men called Price “a stupid f_____” and “a dumb f_____,” not realizing that Price spoke Spanish and could understand them.  Price stepped into the deli to buy cigarettes, thinking that his two assailants would leave, but they were waiting for him in the street when he came out of the shop, and reignited the confrontation.  Price recalled that one of the men threatened him, “I know where you live, f_____.”  The second man added, “You better run away before he kills you.”  Then the physical attack commenced.  Miraculously, he somehow survived the savage beating and managed to get home before losing consciousness.  Though Price says he does not remember very much about the beating, he says that when he regained consciousness in the hospital, he was surprised and relieved to be alive.  As for his alleged attackers, Price told the Daily News, “I hope they rot in jail…I don’t understand how someone can do this to somebody.  They almost killed another human being.”  City officials immediately decried the attack as an anti-gay hate crime, including City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, NY City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, and City Councilmember John Liu.

Leviticus 18:22 tattoo (News 7 photo).

Leviticus 18:22 tattoo (News 7 photo).

They are calling for the full penalty appropriate to a hate crime assault to be applied to the attackers, if proven guilty.  Hundreds of local citizens marched in protest of the attack, calling for an end to anti-LGBT violence in New York City on October 17.  Supporters of Rodriguez and Aleman have mounted their own rally, denying that the “incident” was a bias-motivated crime, according to yournabe.com.  Both the father and sister of Rodriguez have denied that he is anti-gay.  One of Rodriguez’s chief supporters proudly sported a tattoo on his forearm bearing a quotation from the Hebrew Scriptures, Leviticus 18:22, “You shall not lie with a male as one does a woman.  It is an abomination.” While the tattooed supporter denied that homophobia was a motivation in the assault, he said he has no problem with punishing gay people for their behavior.

October 24, 2009 Posted by | Beatings and battery, Bludgeoning, gay men, harassment, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Latino and Latina Americans, Legislation, Matthew Shepard Act, New York, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Slurs and epithets, Stomping and Kicking Violence, Uncategorized | , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Vicious Queens, NY Attack Highlights Need for a Federal Hate Crimes Law

Anti-Transgender Violence Hot Topic for LGBT Community

Trans peopleNew York City – The Associate Press reports that a major anti-transgender violence forum slated for October 7 will address the rising incidence of attacks against transgender New Yorkers.  Brooklyn Law School is hosting the forum,which will be attended by the family of Lateisha Green, transwoman of color, who was murdered in Syracuse last year.  Her convicted killer, Dwight DeLee, was convicted of manslaughter in her shooting death three months ago.  The conviction was the first under New York State’s hate crimes law, sending a message to perpetrators of violence against transgender people that transphobic attacks will no longer be tolerated in the Empire State.  The Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund, organizers of the Brooklyn forum, point out that transgender people face increasing degrees of “pervasive discrimination, harassment and violence.”  Statistics gathered by transgender advocacy groups note that 12% of all violent attacks against LGBT people in 2008 were perpetrated against transgender people.  As Joseph Erbentraut, Great Lakes Regional Editor for EDGE reported earlier this week, Lesbians, Gay Men, and Bisexuals are complicit in these crimes of violence because of prejudices they hold against gender non-conforming people.  Activists agree that lesbians, gay men, and bisexuals are hardly immune from the prejudice vented against transpeople by the society.  Each group too easily absolutizes the gender presentation they are familiar and comfortable with.  Jokes and slurs aimed by LGB people against transgender people, calling them “trannies” or “drag queens” differ little from the epithets cast at them by straight haters.  While actual instances of anti-trans violence by LGB people are rare, the bias is symptomatic of a tragic lack of awareness that all prejudice against members of the sexual minority is interconnected.  The Lateisha Green case, however, is a source of hope in New York.  While the conviction of DeLee was based on anti-gay epithets he used while murdering Green rather than transphobic ones, the severity of the first-degree manslaughter sentence woke the Empire State legal community up, and began a movement to add transphobic language to the hate crimes penal code as well as homophobic speech.  The precedent-setting case sends a message that attacks against transgender New Yorkers will no longer be tolerated.  Erbentraut reports that all sources he contacted agreed that the most effective way to blunt anti-transgender violence would be the swift passage of comprehensive hate crimes protections and employment security legislation at the federal level, such as the Matthew Shepard Act, now in the House-Senate conference process, and the recently introduced Employment Non-Discrimination Act.

October 8, 2009 Posted by | African Americans, anti-LGBT hate crime murder, Bisexual persons, ENDA, gay men, gun violence, harassment, Hate Crime Statistics, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Law and Order, Legislation, Lesbian women, Matthew Shepard Act, Media Issues, New York, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Slurs and epithets, Social Justice Advocacy, transgender persons, transphobia | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Anti-Transgender Violence Hot Topic for LGBT Community

Protecting Wretches: Why Freedom of Speech Belongs to Fred Phelps, Too

Phelps protestorsRichmond, VA – The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals threw out a $5 million verdict Thursday against protesters from Fred Phelps’ Westboro Baptist Church who picketed the Maryland funeral of a U.S. Marine who was killed in Iraq with signs bearing messages like “Thank God for IED’s,” and “Priests Rape Boys.”  Surely the most offensive sign carried by the protesters at the funeral of Marine Lance Corporal Matthew Snyder of Westminster, MD, was “Thank God for Dead Soldiers.”  A Baltimore jury had awarded Snyder’s father $5 million in damages from the Topeka, Kansas-based church for the emotional stress and invasion of privacy visited on the family by the protestors.  The three-judge panel of the court of appeals ruled that the language employed by Phelps’ church members, equating the death of Lance Corporal Snyder with God’s judgement against the United States for laxity on homosexuality was “imaginative and hyperbolic rhetoric” that was protected by the First Amendment as freedom of speech.  The messages the church group issued were meant to ignite debate and could not be understood as personally pertaining to the deceased, reasoned the court.  Supporters of the family decried the decision, and predictably, the Phelps Clan at Westboro Baptist Church applauded it.  Sean E. Summers, attorney for Mr. Snyder, vowed to appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court.  Shirley Phelps-Roper, daughter of Fred Phelps, welcomed the ruling.  Speaking to the Associated Press, Phelps-Roper, who was one of the protestors named in the lawsuit, said, “They had no case but they were hoping the appellate court would not do their duty to follow the rule of law and the appellate court would not do that. They didn’t change God and they didn’t stop us. What they managed to do was give us a huge door, a global door of utterance. Our doctrine is all over the world because of what they did.”  The Supreme Court will or will not hear the appeal the Snyder family says it will bring them, as the high court pleases.  But the guarantee of freedom of speech belongs to wretches as well as the righteous, and as hard as it is to admit its protections for grave errors in judgment, taste, good order, and belief, such protection ensures that truth remains free to combat error in the marketplace of ideas, morals, and customs.  As bitter as it sounds, the court of appeals decision was correct, both for the country, and for LGBT people and their supporters, in the end.  No outfit in America has said more inflammatory things about LGBT people than Phelps and his church, comprised of mostly family members.  The 1998 protest of Matthew Shepard’s funeral in Casper, WY, declaring that “Matt is in Hell!” and that when “Fags Die, God Laughs” is one of the more notorious examples of how wretched hate speech can be in the case of victims of anti-LGBT prejudice.  Finding that their virulent anti-gay rhetoric was losing its public shock value, Phelps’ hate mongers moved on to besmirching the memories of American military servicemembers who had died in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Phelps has not won at every turn.  A public monument proclaiming Matthew Shepard’s damnation, to be put in a Kansas municipal park, was blocked by city officials.  In the end, the defeat of anti-LGBT hate speech is the responsibility of everyone, gay and straight, who know that the Phelps message is morally, spiritually, and patriotically bankrupt.  In Pompeii, buried by volcanic ash in CE 79, graffiti scrawled on a wall proclaims, “Samius to Cornelius: go hang yourself!”  It is all but forgotten, as are Samius and Cornelius, and so will Phelps’ baseless rantings, as LGBT people and their allies continue to show themselves to be greater in character than their adversaries.  Hate speech does incite some people to violence against queer folk.  Too many cases exist of hateful, religious rhetoric being used to justify torture and murder of LGBT victims to ignore how wretches use God’s warrant to harm others.  Any case of bias-generated violence against LGBT people must be prosecuted swiftly to the full extent of the law, and passage of the Matthew Shepard Act is necessary so that these prosecutions may be pursued vigorously and successfully. But freedom of speech means more to truth than it does to error.  At every turn, LGBT folk and their allies may and must immediately and non-violently refute the falsehoods of bad religion so that justice may win out in American life, so that the better angels of the American spirit may rouse themselves to make protests like these seem as petty as scrawlings on an outhouse wall.

September 26, 2009 Posted by | bi-phobia, Bisexual persons, gay men, harassment, Hate Crimes, Heterosexism and homophobia, Kansas, Law and Order, Lesbian women, Matthew Shepard Act, military, Monuments and markers, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, Politics, Popular Culture, Protests and Demonstrations, religious intolerance, Slurs and epithets, Social Justice Advocacy, Special Comments, transgender persons, transphobia | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Protecting Wretches: Why Freedom of Speech Belongs to Fred Phelps, Too

Transgender Latina Stabbed to Death in Los Angeles: Story of Injustice

paulina_ibarra1-450x250Los Angeles, CA – Paulina Ibarra, transgender Latina, was found stabbed to death in her apartment in East Los Angeles on August 28.  The transgender community quickly moved to help the LAPD identify a “person of interest,” 24-year-old Jesus Catalan, who is wanted for jumping parole.  Police as of this writing are still seeking Catalan to question him in regards to Ms. Ibarra’s murder, believing him to have been at the scene of the crime.  While the LAPD has not definitively determined that her murder is a transphobic hate crime, the case is being investigated as if it were, according to Officer Sara Faden.  According to the Los Angeles Daily News, all the LAPD is willing to say at this point is that a suspect, or suspects, apparently entered Ibarra’s home, “engaged in a physical confrontation, resulting in the victim being stabbed to death.”  Victoria Ortega, transgender community leader and activist, told ABC 7 News that the Los Angeles trans community won’t stand idly by and let a killer get away: “We’re here to say that we’re not going to let somebody come in here and kill one of our members and let it happen and let it be forgotten.”  Innuendo has been used to downplay the Ibarra murder, such as suggestions that Catalan, who allegedly frequented prostitutes may have been in Ms. Ibarra’s apartment for that purpose.  Such tactics in the press often diminish the victim in the eyes of the public, and just as often are later shown to be false, after the damage to the story, the investigation, and the character of the victim is already done.  Added to such reductionistic tendencies in press reports are factors in Ms. Ibarra’s identity, that she was non-white, transgender, and Latina.  The cumulative effect of these downplaying tendencies in the press and in public consciousness is subtly to blame the victim for her own demise, an insidious injustice.  While the story of the search for Catalan achieved moderate coverage in the mainstream media, and a bit more in the LGBT press, no follow-up news has been forthcoming on Ms. Ibarra, another indication that her death is being downplayed as less significant than if she were a white, straight male with a family.  The murders of transwomen of color have reached an epidemic proportion in the United States, a newsworthy item that is largely unknown because of cultural and media insensitivity.

September 26, 2009 Posted by | anti-LGBT hate crime murder, Blame the victim, California, Hate Crimes, Latino and Latina Americans, Law and Order, Media Issues, Perpetrators of Hate Crime, stabbings, transgender persons, transphobia, Unsolved LGBT Crimes | , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Transgender Latina Stabbed to Death in Los Angeles: Story of Injustice