Published: June 15, 2009 08:08 am      

Hate crimes law may pass

Ada — A 21-year-old man met two other men in a bar on Oct. 7, 1998, in Laramie, Wyo.

Russell Henderson and Aaron McKinney offered the Wyoming University student, Matthew Shepard, a ride home.

But the ride soon turned deadly when Henderson and McKinney robbed, tortured and tied Shepard to a fence in a rural area – and left him to die.

Shepard died in a hospital room five days after the incident. Both Henderson and McKinney were incarcerated, and are currently serving two consecutive life sentences.

During the trial, some accused the murderers of targeting Shepard solely because he was gay. The prosecutor wanted to charge the murderers with a hate crime, but Wyoming had nothing in its statutes that considered targeting someone’s “sexual orientation” a hate crime.

This caused Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) to author S. 909, known as the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act.

The act adds the categories of gender, sexual orientation, gender identity and disability to the federal hate crimes statutes. Current law covers race, color, religion and national origin. If a violent act is motivated only because a person is in one of those categories, the penalty is up to 10 years in prison and a fine.

If the offense includes death or “kidnapping or an attempt to kidnap, aggravated sexual abuse or an attempt to commit aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to kill” then one “shall be imprisoned for any term of years or for life.”

Some do not believe adding these categories will help prevent or deter people from committing violent acts. T. Walter Newmaster, a local attorney, said the bill will fail to improve relations between minority groups.

“It seems to me ludicrous to try and criminally prosecute people, in most instances for what ends up being their ignorances and prejudices for which they don’t even know why they hold them,” Newmaster said. “It seems a little silly to me.”

The bill also has a controversial provision that allows the federal government to charge someone who has already been acquitted of the same crime at the state level.

The bill states that no prosecution will be taken by the U.S. unless a “verdict or sentence obtained pursuant to the state charges left demonstratively unvindicated the federal interest in eradicating bias-motivated violence.”

This contradicts the Fifth Amendment’s protection of double jeopardy, which has prompted four members of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission to publicly oppose the bill.

“We believe that the act will do little good and a great deal of harm,” the four members said in a written letter to Congress. “Its most important effect will be to allow federal authorities to re-prosecute a broad category of defendants who have already been acquitted by state juries.”

The bill also expands the power of the federal government in other ways. Under current hate crime statutes, the federal government can prosecute those who commit violent acts during a “federally-protected activity,” such as a child attending school. This bill changes that, and allows the federal government to prosecute those who engaged in a violent act if that act has any connection to “interstate commerce.”

This is very ambiguous. A person could have bought a gun in one state, and taken it to another state to commit the crime. This would allow prosecution at the federal level.

Even though hate crimes may not be a significant problem for this area, some local law enforcement officers are open to letting the federal government have more control over hate crime investigations.

“The more resources we have, the better we like it,” Assistant Police Chief Maj. Carl Allen said. “I’d give a case a day to the FBI if they’d take it.”

Allen said there are laws already in place that sufficiently protect people against violent crimes, but does not care if the bill passes.

“We’re going to enforce the law depending on what the law says,” he said. “If we try to agree or disagree with every law that’s in place, we’d be very frustrated.”

S. 909 is currently in the Senate Judiciary Committee and has not been introduced to the entire Senate. A bill with the identical language of S. 909 is House Resolution 1913, which passed the House by a 249-175 vote. HR 1913 is now being reviewed by the Senate Judiciary Committee and is expected to be introduced to the Senate soon.

The public may express their opinion of the bill by phoning Sen. Jim Inhofe at 202-224-4721 or Sen. Tom Coburn at 202-224-5754.