Murder Most Foul: Transgender Holocaust in the United States
Chicago, IL – The Great Lakes Regional Editor of EDGE reports that the slaughter of transgender persons in the United States has already gone 12 per cent higher than last year at this time, and the grim statistics are growing. Joseph Erbentraut, in his important essay, “Violence Against the Transgendered Only Getting Worse,” published on edgeonthenet.com, notes that the silence and invisibility common to LGBT hate crime murders is intensified for transgender Americans. As in the case of Paulina Ibarra, the lives of transgender victims are often ignored until a more culturally sensational aspect of the crime surfaces, as it did in the August stabbing death of the East Los Angeles Latina transwoman when a known parole jumper surfaced as a “person of interest” in the investigation. Until then, Ibarra’s brutal murder was largely neglected, even by the LGBT press, and her life has been reduced to a string of seamy innuendoes and a few glam photos. Other notorious instances this year have been the broad-daylight attack on Ty’lia “Nana Boo-Boo” Mack in D.C. last month, Lateisha Green, shot to death in Syracuse, NY last November, Angie Zapata, bludgeoned to death with a fire extinguisher in Greeley, CO last July, and Duanna Johnson and Ebony Whitaker who died on the streets of Memphis, TN last November and July, respectively. According to Erbentraut, the media are largely to blame for this stunning neglect of one of the most important human rights stories of 2009: “Underreporting from official statistics leaves the issue in the hands of media outlets, which have historically been known for problems identifying victims’ genders through using incorrect names and pronouns,” he writes. “The past year has also seen a number of examples of media programs condoning violence against the community,” Erbentraut continues, “including a radio news program on KRXQ Sacramento which referred to gender dysphoric children as ‘idiots’ and ‘freaks.’ Co-host Arnie States said he ‘[looked] forward to when [transgender children] go out into society and society beats them down…'” While 32 states have some form of hate crime legislation that increases the penalty for violence against LGB people, only 11 have statutes covering their transgender population. Only Brazil, with 80 transgender murders this year, has a larger number of transgender killings than the United States. Until gays, lesbians, and bisexual people and their allies begin to take violence against transgender people, especially transgender people of color, as seriously as they do crimes against themselves, this deplorable trend will surely continue.
Transgender Latina Stabbed to Death in Los Angeles: Story of Injustice
Los 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.
For Courageous Mothers of LGBT Murder Victims, There is No Closure
Pat and Lynn Mulder at USF, Stephen Coddington photo for the Times
Families of LGBT hate crimes murder victims are on the front lines of grief and loss when a homophobic attack takes the life of someone they love. This is especially true of their mothers. That powerful truth was driven home for me again by learning of Pat and Lynn Mulder’s courageous appearance at the Hate Crimes Awareness Summit held this week at the University of South Florida. Pat shared the story of how her beloved son, Ryan Keith Skipper, lived and died at the hands of brutal, anti-gay attackers in rural Polk County Florida on March 14, 2007. The popular 25-year-old Skipper was stabbed over 19 times, and left to bleed out on a lonely dirt road in Wahneta, a rural town in the Winter Haven region. One of his murderers, Joseph “Smiley” Bearden has been sentenced to life without parole earlier this year, and a second alleged killer, William D. “Bill Bill” Brown is to stand trial on October 12. Reporting on the Summit, Alexandra Zayas of the St. Petersburg Times, relates how Pat had to overcome her reluctance and nervousness about speaking in front of crowds about the worst tragedy in her family’s history. “The worst thing in the world that can happen to you has already happened. There’s nothing else to be afraid of.” Speaking with passion and the conviction that no family should ever have to endure what hers has, Pat and her husband Lynn have tirelessly reached out to others bereaved by unreasoning hatred. Barely a year after her son’s murder, Pat traveled to Fort Lauderdale to see Denise King, mother of African American youth Simmie Williams, Jr., who was shot for being transgender by attackers who have not yet been identified or apprehended. At at town hall meeting dedicated to the memory of 17-year-old Williams, Pat introduced herself to Mrs. King as Ryan’s mother, and enfolded her in an embrace that King later said was deeply meaningful to her. Speaking to the Times about that moment, Pat said, “It’s beyond being women. It’s beyond being different races, different backgrounds. It has nothing to do with that. It’s the hearts of two mothers,” Pat said. “For a moment, there’s someone who’s helping you hold up your pain.” The real unsung heroes of the effort to win passage of the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act are women like Pat Mulder and Denise King who became “accidental activists” for the sake of their children who died so senselessly. Elke Kennedy, mother of Greenville, SC victim, Sean William Kennedy, Pauline Mitchell, mother of Navajo two-spirit son, F.C. Martinez, Jr. of Cortez, CO, Pat Kuteles, mother of U.S. Army Pvt. Barry Winchell, murdered at Fort Campbell, KY, Kathy Jo Gaither, sister of Sylacauga, AL victim Bill Joe Gaither, and, certainly, Judy Shepard of Casper, WY who is currently touring the nation to promote passage of the LGBT hate crimes bill named for her son Matthew, are but a few outstanding examples of women whose love overcame untold obstacles to add their voices to the chorus of Americans, gay and straight, who want anti-queer violence to come to an end forever. These courageous women and many other family members around the nation have become the most effective spokespersons for human rights because of their unsought-for mission to stamp out hate from the American vocabulary for all people, especially LGBTQ folk who are so much at risk. How do mothers do it? Pat Mulder says that for parents of gay murder victims, there is no closure, only the determination to turn up the volume on what hate crimes do to families.
~ Stephen Sprinkle for the Unfinished Lives Project
Green’s Murderer Gets 25 Years for Transgender Hate Crime
Dwight DeLee on Trial
Syracuse, NY – Dwight DeLee, a 20-year-old construction worker from Upstate New York was sentenced Tuesday to the maximum of 25 years in prison for the hate killing of transgender woman, Lateisha Green. Green, 22, was a Male to Female transgender person, shot to death by DeLee last November as she and her brother sat in a car outside a house party. Since the age of 16, Green had lived as a woman, wearing women’s clothing, and taking her female name, Lateisha, in preference to her male birth name, Moses. In determining that DeLee’s crime was manslaughter rather than murder, the court found that he had not intended to kill Green in the attack, but only to terrorize and injure her. Two aspects of the sentence are of particular note for the LGBT community as it seeks justice for Lateisha and all at-risk transgender persons. First, the sentence was the maximum amount of time prescribed by New York law for the crime of manslaughter, indicating the seriousness with which the court took the case. Second, in sentencing DeLee for an anti-transgender hate crime, Judge William Walsh noted the deplorable bias-motivation of the crime. The jury found that Green was indeed selected for a violent attack based on her perceived gender presentation and gender identity, the hallmark of a transphobic hate crime. This verdict and sentence are believed to be only the second in the United States explicitly against the perpetrator of an anti-transgender violent crime, the first being the conviction and sentencing earlier this year of Allen Ray Andrade to life without parole for the hate crime murder of 18-year-old Greeley, Colorado transgender Latina, Angie Zapata.
Serial Hate Crimes Against LGBTs Up 63% in Colorado
Denver – In a report by the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs issued Tuesday, the numbers of anti-LGBT hate crimes in the Centennial State jumped 63% in one year. Among the 2008 murders of queer folk was the notorious beating-death of 18-year-old Angie Zapata, a transgender Latina living in Greeley. Allen Ray Andrade, a date, repeatedly bashed Zapata with a home fire extinguisher until she succumbed. Andrade’s conviction for murder under Colorado’s Hate Crime Law was a landmark moment, demonstrating to the nation how significant hate crime enhancements can be in penalizing fatal bias-related attacks against LGBT people. Though he used a version of the trans-panic defense to excuse his actions, arguing that Zapata had somehow deserved her death because of “deceiving” him as to her biological gender, Andrade was sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole. According to the Denver Daily News, the Colorado Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs (COAVP) expressed concern over the 24% spike in the number of offenders, meaning that multiple perpetrators attacked a smaller number of victims during the past year. This indicates that certain victims of anti-LGBT hate crimes are targeted for violence that unfolds in a spectrum from verbal harassment to physical attack by more than one antagonist. While this disturbing feature of homophobic and transphobic violence had been suspected by gay rights activists, this report in Colorado is the first to confirm their fears. The percentage of victims also rose significantly during 2008. While the nationwide average rise in victims of harassment, bashing, and murder was 2%, the Colorado numbers moved up a full 8%. Added to the increases of reported violent attacks against LGBT people in Minnesota, Michigan, California, and Tennessee, the Colorado hate crimes statistics contribute to a growing sense that a full-scale national trend of increasing harm against members of the sexual minority is in the offing.
WaPo: Anti-Latino/a and Anti-LGBT Hate Crimes Spiral Upward Together
Washington, DC – The Washington Post reports in a late-breaking story that incidents of bias-related crimes against Latino/a people and LGBT people are rising sharply on seemingly parallel tracks, according to FBI findings. In a June 16 article entitled “Hate Crimes Rise as Immigration Debate Heats Up,” Spencer Hsu, reporter for WaPo, writes that officials are concerned about the abrupt rise in violent crimes against both groups: “The FBI reported in October that the number of [total] hate crime incidents dropped in 2007 by about 1 percent, to 7,624. But violence against Latinos and gay people bucked the trend. The number of hate crimes directed at gay men and lesbians increased about 6 percent, from 1,195 to 1,265, the FBI reported.” It should be noted that the actual rise in hate crimes against LGBT people is actually in excess of 28% in the last year, according to the more comprehensive statistics reported by the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs. Shrill voices in the media and organization of xenophobic hate groups on the internet are contributing to this alarming trend. Most recently, as Mariela Rosario writes for http://www.latina.com, Minutemen stand accused of the murder of a Latino immigrant family. In a May 30th home invasion attack just now being shared widely in the national media, three members of the anti-immigrant group Minutemen American Defense (MAD) allegedly burst into the Arivaca, AZ house of Raul Junior Flores, 29, and his 9-year-old daughter, Brisenia, and shot them dead. Flores’ wife using a shotgun returned fire, repelling the attackers, and wounding one of them. Shawna Forde, 41, Jason Eugene Bush, 34, and Albert Robert Glaxiola, 42, stand accused of the crime. The stated mission of the Minutemen American Defense is summed up in Forde’s own words, “We will expose and report what we know and find, we will recruit the serious and train the revolutionist, time for words have passed the time for bravery and conviction are now.” The Pima County (AZ) Sheriff’s Department is still investigating. The murder of Flores and his young daughter has sparked outrage among Latino/a rights groups. As The Unfinished Lives Project has previously reported in numerous stories over several months, the tragic
Romel and Diego Sucuzhañay at Brooklyn DA's Press Conference
victimization of Latino and Latina folk, gay, bi, transgender and straight often converges in a terrible way. José Sucuzhañay, and his brother, Romel, Ecuadorans visiting the Bushwick section of Brooklyn, NY were brutally assaulted on the night of December 7, 2008. Hakim Scott, 25, and Keith Phoenix, 28, beat the Sucuzhañay brothers with a beer bottle and an aluminum ball bat shouting slurs at them for their ethnicity and their perceived sexual orientation. The savage attack was apparently motivated by a toxic combined hatred of Latino immigrants and gay people. The brothers, huddled together against the cold, were walking arm-in-arm from a party. Ironically, José, who died from his wounds, and his brother Romel, are both heterosexual. José leaves behind a 10-year-old son, Brian, and a 5-year-old daughter, Joanna, who is living with Down Syndrome. As an attorney for the Sucuzhañay family told the New York Post, “The family has suffered tremendously. It was a brutal murder.” Scott and Phoenix have been indicted for second-degree murder as a hate crime by the Brooklyn District Attorney, and await trial. Often set at odds by “common wisdom” and the media, the Latino/a immigrant community and the LGBT community share a truly common need for unity in the face of irrational hatred of “the other.” The Ecuadoran media covered the crime widely, putting an important face on anti-LGBT hate crimes in the United States.
President Obama Meets Judy Shepard at White House
Washington, DC – President Barak Obama met Judy Shepard, mother of slain gay son, Matthew Shepard, in the Oval Office of the White House, according to Jon Barrett of The Advocate. President Obama affirmed his support of the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act still pending action in the United States Senate. The House version of the bill has already passed by a wide margin. While a Senator, President Obama voted in favor of the act, and told Mrs. Shepard that he would sign it once it reaches his desk. Though brief, the meeting was a significant indication of the support of this president for justice for LGBT people and their families and friends. The Obama administration has been criticized for moving slowly on LGBT issues. Former White House aide to President Bill Clinton, David Mixner, for example, is calling for a march on Washington to pressure the president to follow through on his support for the LGBT community, such as the repeal of DADT (Don’t Ask Don’t Tell) and of DOMA (Defense of Marriage Act). Critics point out that other groups who helped elect President Obama have already received significant support and legislation, such as women, blacks, and hispanics. The LGBT vote went heavily in favor of the president in the November general election, playing a significant role in swinging states into the Democratic column in the case of Florida, Indiana, and North Carolina, where slim margins suggest the necessity of the queer vote. Shepard counseled patience with the president today. “We are victims of our own hope,” she says. “These bills are going to get passed, it’s just going to take time and work.” For now, Shepard is calling on citizens to call their Senators to urge them for passage of the Shepard Act when it comes to floor of the Senate. She also calls on friends of anti-LGBT Hate Crimes legislation across the country to discourage Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada from attaching the Shepard Act to a Defense Department Appropriations Bill, which she believes will hurt its chances of passage.
Murdered Trans-teen Gwen Araujo Vindicated by CA Appeal Court Ruling
Newark, CA, May 13, 2009 – A California state court of appeal upheld the second degree murder convictions of two young East Bay men for their part in the strangling, beating, and murder of 17 year old male-to-female transgender Latina Gwen Amber Rose Araujo in 2002. Jose Merel and Michael Magidson had appealed their convictions on the grounds that the Alameda County trial judge had not defined the crimes properly to the jury at the time of the original trial in 2005, and that there had not been sufficient evidence for second degree murder convictions. The appeal court ruled 3-0 against the petition of the defendants, who will continue to serve out their 15-year sentences for the grisly murder.
The 2002 Araujo case drew national attention to the plight of transgender people in the United States, especially transgender people of color. Araujo, born biologically male and originally known as Eddie, had transitioned to being female by the time of the assault. After she died, her mother legally changed her name to Gwen as a sign of love and respect. Her killers, who knew her as “Lida” had known her for months, and Gwen believed they were fast friends. Both Merel and Magidson had sex with Araujo orally and anally. According to their defense, she had not revealed her biological identity to them. When her biological maleness was discovered, the defense went on to contend, the men attacked Araujo “in the heat of the moment,” and therefore deserved convictions for a lesser charge of manslaughter instead of murder. The prosecution successfully argued against this version of the “trans-panic defense,” and secured the murder convictions against them. Two other defendants in the case, Jaron Nabors and Jason Cazares pled guilty to manslaughter and were sentenced to 11 and 6 years respectively. They have not sought to challenge their convictions.
The Araujo case sharpened the national debate on the trans-panic defense. The outcome of the 2002 trial went a long way toward refuting the once widely held notion that trans people somehow brought on attacks against themselves. As Masen Davis, executive director of the Transgender Law Center noted to reporters,the ruling of the court of appeal definitively rejected the claim that the murder of a young woman like Gwen should be reduced to a lesser charge just because she was transgender. “We are thankful that the Court of Appeal saw through this blatant prejudice, and upheld the convictions of Gwen’s killers,” she said.
Clergy Call for Passage of Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act on Capitol Hill
Unfinished Lives Project Director, Dr. Stephen Sprinkle, delivers the Opening Prayer at Clergy Call 2009
More than 300 LGBT Clergy and Allies hit Capitol Hill to pray and lobby for the passage of the Matthew Shepard Act and a fully trans-inclusive Employment Non-Descrimination Act. A new breeze seemed to be blowing in the halls of government. The Human Rights Campaign Religion and Faith Program, directed by Harry Knox and Sharon Groves, coordinated three days of events, May 4-6, 2009. Among the speakers for the Press Conference were Dr. Tony Campolo, noted evangelical leader, and Dr. Jo Hudson, Rector and Senior Pastor of Cathedral of Hope in Dallas. Clergy from all 50 states attended. The Matthew Shepard Act awaits the action of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and chief sponsor Senator Ted Kennedy in order to bring the legislation (which has already passed the House of Representatives by a healthy margin) to the floor of the Senate. President Obama has publicly indicated that he would sign the bill into law when it reaches his desk. Federal Hate Crimes legislation was first introduced in Congress 17 years ago. So much has happened since, and so many have needlessly died. With the Hebrew Prophets, the ministers, rabbis, and priests meeting for Clergy Call 2009 cry out, “How long, O Lord?”
The gathering of large contingents of LGBT Clergy and Allies to lobby for passage of fully inclusive hate crimes federal legislation, first in 2007 and now, has done much to persuade fence-sitting members of Congress that the radical right does not own the religious vote on this issue.
Angie Zapata’s Murderer Sentenced to 60 More Years
Allen Ray Andrade, Angie Zapata's Convicted Murderer
Denver – the AP reports that Allen Ray Andrade, convicted of murder in the first degree in the Angie Zapata transgender murder case and sentenced to life without parole has been determined to be a “habitual criminal” and sentenced to an additional 60 years in prison. Weld County District Judge Marcello Kopcow ruled on May 8 that the three remaining convictions, for bias-motivated crime, aggravated motor-vehicle theft and identity theft, should carry such a penalty in view of the deliberate criminality with which Andrade committed these offenses.
Angie Zapata, trans-Latina, died violently at 18 years of age
Supporters of federal hate crimes legislation hope that this application of the Colorado hate crimes law will add pressure for the passage of a fully transgender inclusive Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act that is awaiting action in the United States Senate. The House of Representatives has recently passed its own version of the legislation, the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act, by a large margin. President Obama has publicly stated that he would sign a fully trans-inclusive hate crimes law when it reaches his desk.
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…
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Dr. Sprinkle has given his Unfinished Lives presentation to these and other community groups and organizations. Read More…
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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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