Thirteen years ago today Matthew Shepard died. He’d met two men at a bar who agreed to give him a ride home. Instead of taking him home they drove to a remote rural spot and robbed him., He was pistol whipped and tortured, he suffered a severe brain stem injury and his body lost the ability to regulate his vital functions, he was tied to fence and left to die.
A cyclist discovered Shepard the next day. He’d been tied to the fence for eighteen hours and slipped into a coma from which he never awoke. At first the cyclist had thought that Shepard’s body was a scarecrow. His injuries were too severe for Doctors to operate on, and five days after the attack Shepard died, he was 21 years old.
The death of Matthew Shepard drew international attention to the concept of hate crimes and acts of violence against people because of their sexuality. At the trial of the two men, Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson, it was established that they had deliberately targeted Shepard, intending to rob a gay man. At one stage of the proceedings McKinney defended his and Henderson’s actions via a gay panic defence claiming that Sheppard had come on to them and this had led to a period of temporary insanity. The prosecution successfully argued that the murder was a planned action.
Following Shepard’s death his parents created The Matthew Shepard Foundation, an organisation that aims to replace hate with compassion, understanding and acceptance. The foundation works with GLBT youth and has also lobbied for the introduction of hate crime laws in the United States. The Mathew Shepard-James Byrd Hate Crime Prevention Act became law in 2009. The act altered the USA’s existing hate crime legislation to include crimes that are motivated by the victims actual or perceived gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or disability.
The other person named in the act, James Byrd was an African American man killed in 1988 by three men who are alleged to be white supremacists. Byrd was tied to the back of a truck and dragged behind it for three miles until he was decapitated. Alongside the acts inclusion of sexuality and gender it also broadened the jurisdiction of federal hate crimes.
The reactions of the people of lived in Laramie, Wyoming – the town where Shepard was murdered were captured and presented in a play, The Laramie Project that continues to be performed around the world, including two productions in Perth this year.
Most gay people know the name Matthew Shepard, but we don’t know the tnames of housands of other people who have lost their lives through violence because of their sexuality and gender identity, and even here in Australia there are still states that permit ‘homosexual panic’ as the grounds for defense against murder – though thankfully Western Australia is not one of them.
Thirteen years after Matthew Shepard, people of diverse sexuality and gender still have to worry about their safety. People are still being killed in western countries like America, New Zealand and Australia – and the crimes occurring in African and Middle Eastern countries – those that get reported – are horrific.
Take a moment to remember those who are not with us, and those who fight for better rights and safety for everyone. October is Community Safety Month in Western Australia. How can we make our community safer?
Graeme Watson>
editor@www.outinperth.com
