Students perform play based on hate crime (A PC gay hate crime).

Students perform play based on hate crime By NAOMI L. JENKINS Bucks County Courier Times

Middletown - Matthew Shepard, 21, had been a University of Wyoming student for only a few months when he was the victim of a hate crime in 1998.

Few in the town of Laramie knew him as well as his former roommate and good friend Romaine Patterson. The two previously lived together in Denver.

She talked publicly about Shepard, who was gay, for three minutes at a vigil the day after he died - five days after the attack.

"Once I got up and spoke about Matthew, my life was changed because the national media had my name, and my phone rang constantly after that," Patterson told drama students at George School in Middletown.

She told the students that if she started crying before the crowd of 5,000 strangers at the vigil, she knew she wouldn't stop, so she fought back the tears.

The George School students have studied and rehearsed for four months for their play, "The Laramie Project,'' based on the murder. The drama recounts Shepard's brutal slaying at the hands of Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson on the outskirts of Laramie, a cattle town in Wyoming.

The two men are serving life sentences for the crime. They met Shepard, who stood just 5 feet, 2 inches tall, in a Laramie bar, pretended to be gay and then lured him to their pickup truck. They drove to a secluded area where they pistol-whipped, burned and robbed him. Shepard was found 18 hours later, tied to a fence and left for dead.

Like a documentary, the play recounts the crime. The actors portray Laramie residents who give their opinions of the attack.

Directed by acting teacher Nelson Camp, students will perform "The Laramie Project" at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday in the George School's Walton Center.

"I'm honored to be able to play her because I think she's a very, very important person in the play, very courageous, very brave," Debbie said.

"I don't think enough people stand up and talk about an issue like this," Debbie said. "Hopefully they will realize how serious hate crimes are because it's not just somebody else's problem. It affects all of us."

Another student, Alley Mazzullo, 16, said the play is funny at times but poignant and educational.

She portrays a pastor's wife who doesn't condone homosexuality but is horrified by Shepard's murder.

"I think I've learned that even though people are not accepting [of others], they still value life," Alley said. "I want the audience to see there's a ton of different people out there. You can't just discriminate against one group because there are different types of people within that group."

"It's been a powerful experience already," said Carolyn Belle Lyday, a religion teacher and adviser for the school's gay and lesbian club. "It helps people be honest about how they really feel."

Patterson, who lives in Brooklyn, worked for various gay and lesbian activist groups before founding an organization called Angel Action, which holds peaceful demonstrations. She travels the nation giving speeches and is a satellite radio talk show co-host for a 24-hour gay talk channel. Her show is called "Derek and Romaine."

"I love it. I talk to a lot of straight people every day on satellite radio. That is a form of activism that's very new to me," Patterson said.

She told kids she didn't set out to be an activist, she just wanted to do what was right.

"When you hear something that doesn't sit right with you, say something. That's what activism is. You don't have to scream or yell," Patterson said.

Patterson wished she'd have done more of that during her teen years that were especially difficult.

She came "out of the closet" at age 13 in her tiny home town of Ranchester, Wyoming, which has about 670 residents.

"A lot of people I'd known all my life suddenly didn't want to be my friend anymore," she said. "By the time I was 16, I had two bleeding ulcers and I had dropped from 140 pounds to 103. It was so stressful."

Patterson said she wished that instead of ignoring that student, she would have turned and said, " 'That hurts my feelings. You're making me feel bad.' Sometimes people do these things and they don't think about how it feels."

I wonderer if they will also put on a play about this hate-crime which has largely been ignored in MSM:

Court-Martial Records Link Killing to Sex
The Associated Press
http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/1-12182004-419215.html

RALEIGH, N.C. - A National Guardsman who pleaded guilty to killing a 17-year-old Iraqi soldier said he shot the young man after they had consensual sex in a guard tower, a newspaper reported Saturday, citing court-martial records.

Pvt. Federico Daniel Merida, 21, pleaded guilty to murder without premeditation and other charges during a court-martial in Iraq in September.

Merida was sentenced Sept. 25 to 25 years in prison and reduced in rank and will be dishonorably discharged. He is being held at Fort Leavenworth, Kan., a Leavenworth spokeswoman said.

Army officials at Forward Operating Base Danger, where the court-martial was held in Iraq, had previously withheld details of the case.

However, The News & Observer of Raleigh reported Saturday that records show Merida and the Iraqi were on guard duty May 11 in a tower on the perimeter of an Army camp near Tikrit in northern Iraq. At about 10:30 p.m., Merida shot the teen 11 times with his carbine.

Merida first told investigators the teen demanded money at gunpoint. Later, he said he killed the boy because he forced him to have sex. In a third interview, Merida said he got angry after the two had consensual sex.

Merida also pleaded guilty to two counts of giving false statements.

Merida apologized to the victim's family during the court-martial, records show. "He was a son, a brother, someone very important to them," he said. "I took someone they loved and cared for."

Merida, who was born in Veracruz, Mexico, has a wife and toddler son.

He was a member of the 113th Field Artillery Battalion's Battery B, based in Monroe.

December 18, 2004 2:46 PM

Another idea for a hate-crime play the school could put on:

Massachusetts v. Charles Jaynes

"Molestation Murder Trial"
http://www.courttv.com/archive/verdicts/jaynes.html

On the afternoon of October 1, 1997, 10-year-old Jeffrey Curley told his grandmother, "I have to go do something. I'll be back in a little while." Then he left her Cambridge, Ma. house. His grandmother would be the last one to see him alive.

When Curley did not come home that evening, his family, their neighbors and police organized a large scale search. They also distributed flyers with the boy's picture.

The next day Salvatore Sicari, Curley's neighbor and adult "friend," arrived at the Curleys' home with a handful of the flyers. He expressed his concern over the boy's disappearance and offered his assistance. Sicari also began to speak to Cambridge police, offering bits of information.

Sicari told police that he had last seen Curley on the morning of October 1, when Curley had threatened him with his dog. Sicari said that he told Curley that he would kill the dog if the boy didn't stop.

After that encounter, Sicari said, he met up with Charles Jaynes. Sicari told authorities that he had seen Curley riding in Jaynes' Cadillac in the past. He also claimed that Jaynes had promised Curley a bicycle. He had warned Curley to stay away from Jaynes, Sicari told police.

Jaynes was contacted by Cambridge police on October 2. While he denied knowing Curley, he was arrested on an outstanding warrant and taken into custody. In Jaynes' wallet, police found four receipts for items purchased with a credit card bearing his father's name: Edward Jaynes. The items included a receipt from Bradlees for a Rubbermaid container, a receipt from Home Depot for cement and lime, a receipt for a bicycle and a receipt from an Osco Drug Store for cigars and No-Doz pills.

All of these purchases were made on the day of Curley's disappearance. When questioned, Jaynes said that he knew Curley, but denied seeing him on the day the boy disappeared.

Sicari was contacted again by Cambridge police and continued to provide details. In his statement, Sicari described the killing. While he drove Jaynes' Cadillac, he explained, the 250-pound Jaynes sat on Curley in the back seat. As Curley struggled, Jaynes allegedly told him, "Don't fight it." Jaynes then placed a gasoline soaked rag to the boy's mouth and held it there, killing him, Sicari said.

After the killing, Sicari told police, he and Jaynes drove to numerous stores to buy the items necessary to dispose of Curley's body. Video cameras in two of the stores captured the men at the checkout counter purchasing a Rubbermaid container, a bag of lime and a bag of concrete. The men then left Massachusetts and drove north to Jaynes' apartment in Manchester, New Hampshire. There, according to Sicari, Jaynes took off Curley's clothes and molested the boy's dead body. The sight of this made him ill, said Sicari. When he ran to the bathroom, Jaynes told him, "Don't be a baby. Come out here and help me -- he's starting to stiffen up."

Sicari then admitted to helping Jaynes prepare the body. First they placed Curley's body in the cement-filled Rubbermaid container, put lime on his face and in his mouth to speed decomposition, and sealed the container with duct tape. Then they drove to Maine, where they dumped the container into a river, Sicari said.

Prosecutors believed that Sicari and Jaynes lured Curley into Jaynes' Cadillac with the promise of $50 and a bicycle. One or both of the men allegedly made sexual advances towards the boy, then suffocated him when he resisted.

Prosecutor David Yanetti said it didn't matter which man physically performed the kidnapping and murder. Even if it was Jaynes who actually kidnapped and murdered Curley, Sicari is equally culpable because he intended to commit the crimes and assisted Jaynes in carrying them out, Yanetti insisted.

Sicari maintained that it was Jaynes, a self-admitted pedophile, who killed Curley. Sicari claimed he in no way cooperated with Jaynes or shared in any intent. Sicari also said it was Jaynes who later molested Curley's dead body. The defendant conceded, however, that he did nothing to prevent the killing, that he helped Jaynes prepare Curley's body for disposal, and helped Jaynes dump Curley's corpse into the river. He also admitted that he initially lied to police.

Furthermore, Sicari's defense claimed there are insufficient grounds to warrant the kidnapping charge. Defense attorney Arthur Kelly said Curley had been in Jaynes' Cadillac many times, and there was no evidence to suggest that the boy didn't voluntarily enter the car on the day of the killing.

However, Jaynes pleaded not guilty to kidnapping and first-degree murder. He denied killing Curley and claimed that Sicari lied to police. Because the defendants' stories about Curley's death differed, separate trials were ordered. Sicari was convicted of kidnapping and first-degree murder before Jaynes went to trial.

The Verdict
On December 11, Charles Jaynes was convicted of Second Degree Murder and Kidnapping.

Reported by Court TV's Felice Conte

This from page 3 of the ABC article:

Prosecutor Rerucha recalls that Shepard's friends also contacted his office. Rerucha told "20/20," "They were calling the County Attorney's office, they were calling the media and indicating Matthew Shepard is gay and we don't want the fact that he is gay to go unnoticed."

I have to wonder, if the attackers had been muslim and the victim a straight, white male, would it have been reported thusly (bolding by me):

Prosecutor Rerucha recalls that Shepard's friends also contacted his office. Rerucha told "20/20," "They were calling the County Attorney's office, they were calling the media and indicating Matthew Shepard is a straight, white male and his attackers are muslim. We don't want the fact that his attackers are muslim to go unnoticed."

Something tells me that at that point we would hear how we can't report that he was muslim since it may inflame the muslim community or some other garbage.

In any case, this is a terrible crime these two committed. That it wasn't really a hate crime does not do a whole lot to lessen that in my eyes.

That the MSM hooked onto the gay angle and it became gospel truth is not surprising in the least.

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The murder was motivated by robbery!