The Gay Panic Defence has attracted negative attention in Queensland, with calls for it to be abolished as a justifiable defence for murder. The Gay Panic Defence refers to the situation where a heterosexual charged with the murder of a homosexual – can justify their attack on a panic triggered by unwanted sexual advances.
Evidence gathered by researcher Professor Lee shows that the Gay Panic Argument reinforces negative stereotypes for LGBTI people; including that LGBTI people are sexual deviants and predators. Professor Lee also states that the defence enforces an unconscious bias in favour of heterosexuality.
The Gay Panic Defence can be used to support a number of strategies to justify violent acts – including claims of insanity, self defence, provocation, and diminished capacity.
This defence, which has been described as encouraging a ‘culture of hate’, was used in Queensland in 2008 to attempt to reduce a murder charge.
Jason Andrew Pearce was one of two men charged with the manslaughter of Wayne Ruks, alongside Richard Meerdink, after assuming the Gay Panic Defence. Pearce walked out of jail this month, after serving just four years for his part in the killing.
Ruks’ death occurred on the ground of Maryborough Church, priest for the Church Father Paul Kelly has been actively trying to close the Gay Panic Defence loophole since the incident.
Kelly’s online petition to abolish the defence has garnered 194,000 signatures, Kelly told ABC news –
‘What it says is that a broad sector of the local and world community sees that a law that even unintentionally has a negative effect on one particular group is not allowed.
‘What it’s doing, without acknowledging it, is saying our society can understand that someone can lose it and lash out violently because they have such a revulsion to certain things that are deep in their prejudice, misunderstanding and fear’, he said.
Kelly relaunched his petition against the defence after Attorney General Jarrod Bleijie scrapped previous plans to remove the loophole.
Although the previous state government had accepted a recommendation to change the laws, Bleijie stated ‘The Liberal National Party remains tough on crime. However, given these laws are yet to be tested, [it] does not intend to make any further amendments to the provocation defence at this time’.
Kelly’s petition has received support from English comedian Stephen Fry and American actress Sophia Bush, who stars in One Tree Hill.
Ruks’ mother is in favour of abolishing the Gay Panic Defence, stating during the trial that the defence was ‘a load of rubbish’, claiming that her son was not gay, and had been in a committed heterosexual relationship for ten years.
Kelly told ABC news –‘I have a feeling the Government thinks “this is just a gay agenda, this is a concocted thing to get the gay rights thing going”. It’s violent men who are concocting stories, or imagining stories or even reacting to the smallest of things and being excessive in their violence.
‘Queenslanders don’t want it, Australians don’t want it, and now we can see the world doesn’t want it.’
