(1976–1998)
Matthew
Shepard died from severe injuries he sustained in a violent gay-related hate
crime attack. His death set off a nationwide debate about hate crimes and
homophobia that ultimately led to the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate
Crimes Prevention Act (2009).
Matthew Shepard was born in
Wyoming on December 1, 1976, to Judy and Dennis Shepard. In 1998, two men,
Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson, abducted Shepard and drove him to a
remote area where he was tied to a split-rail fence, beaten severely, and left
to die in the cold of the night. Shepard died just a few days later on October
12, 1998 at the age of 21. His brutal and gruesome death has become one of the
most notorious anti-gay hate crimes in American history and eventually led to
the Matthew Shepard and Hate
Crimes Prevention Act (2009).
Born on December 1,
1976 in the oil boomtown Casper, Wyoming to Judy and Dennis
Shepard, Matthew Wayne Shepard, the elder of two sons, was a
sensitive, soft-spoken, and kind young boy. He went to public school in Casper
until his junior year of high school when Shepard moved with his family to
Dhahran, Saudi Arabia where his father worked in oil safety engineering. He
completed high school at The American School in Switzerland where he studied
German, Italian, and theater and enjoyed music and fashion.
During his senior year, Shepard
took a vacation with three classmates to Morocco. During this trip, Shepard was
raped, beaten and robbed by a gang of locals. Some assert that Shepard's petit
stature (he was only 5’ 2” and 100 pounds) made him particularly vulnerable to
victimization. Although the police attempted to ascertain who committed the
attack, the perpetrators were never caught. After the assault, Shepard sought
therapeutic treatment but had flashbacks, panic attacks, and nightmares. He
continued to experience periods of paranoia, depression, anxiety, and suicidal
ideation for the remainder of his short life.
After graduating high school,
Matthew Shepard briefly attended a small liberal arts school, Catawba College,
in Salisbury, North Carolina, in pursuit of a theatre career. Although Shepard
knew he was gay from a young age, he came out to his mother only after high
school; she reassured him she had known about his sexual identity for years. He
then moved to Raleigh, North Carolina, before moving back home to attend
community college at Casper College.
At Casper, a teacher introduced
him to Romaine Patterson, an outgoing lesbian who became one of Shepard’s close
friends. The two moved to Denver, Colorado and Shepard worked a string of
part-time jobs but always knew his passion was helping people. In 1998, he
moved to Laramie and enrolled at the University of Wyoming, his parents’ alma
mater, because he felt that living in a small town would help him feel safe. As
a 21-year-old freshman, Shepard studied political science and international
relations and wanted to pursue a Foreign Service career. Known to be polite,
thoughtful and a great conversationalist, Shepard quickly became active on
campus and joined the university’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender
(LGBT) student alliance.
Just a few months after
arriving in Laramie, on October 6, 1998, Shepard encountered Aaron McKinney and
Russell Henderson at a local pub, The Fireside Lounge. McKinney and Henderson
saw Shepard as an easy target and made target plans to rob him. In the
early hours of October 7th, the pair lured him away from the bar and drove him
to a rural area where they tied him to a split-rail fence, beat him severely
with the butt of a .357 Smith & Wesson pistol, and left him to die in the
near-freezing temperatures of the early morning hours.
McKinney later stated he
assumed Shepard was dead when they left. Shepard was discovered 18 hours later
by a bicyclist, Aaron Kreifels, who at first thought he was a scarecrow. Still
alive but in a coma, Shepard was rushed to Poudre Valley Hospital in Fort
Collins, Colorado. For four days, Shepard lay comatose in a hospital bed just
down the hall from McKinney (who was there as the result of a hairline fracture
of the skull that he received in a brawl he had instigated just a few hours
after attacking Shepard).
In addition to numerous
bruises, welts, and lacerations, Shepard’s brain stem was severely damaged and
he also was suffering from hypothermia. He was pronounced dead at 12:53 A.M. on
October 12, 1998. Shortly after, police found the bloody gun as well as
Shepard's shoes and wallet in McKinney’s truck McKinney and Henderson were
arrested and were convicted of felony murder and kidnapping. Both received two
consecutive life terms.
Shepard’s memorial service was
held at St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Casper, Wyoming on October 16, 1998 and
was attended by over 700 people (many had to stand outside in the snow),
including friends and family from around the world. Also present were notorious
protestors from the Westboro Baptist Church, including Fred Phelps himself, who
picketed the funeral with homophobic signs. To combat their bigotry, Shepard’s
friend Romaine Patterson organized a group, now called Angel Action, to block
the protestors by wearing white robes and large angelic wings. Because his
brutal attack attracted so much media coverage, Shepard's death was front and
center of the outcry against anti-gay hate and violence.
Despite the anti-gay rhetoric
spouted by McKinney and Henderson throughout the trials that ultimately led to
their life sentences for Shepard’s murder, they were not charged with a hate
crime. As a result, Shepard’s high-profile murder case sparked protests, vigils
and calls for federal legislation to protect LGBT victims of violence.
On October 28, 2009, over
eleven years after Shepard’s murder, President Barrack Obama with Judy
Shepard by his side, signed into law The Matthew Shepard and James Byrd
Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act. The new legislation expanded the
definition of the federal hate crime law by including crimes instigated by an
individual's perceived gender or gender identity (which were previously not
included in FBI hate crime data) and revising the collection standards for
biases motivated by sexual orientation, race, and ethnicity. The
Shepard/Byrd Act gives the Department of Justice the power to investigate and
prosecute bias-motivated violent crimes against LGBT victims.
Shepard’s life and untimely
death have served as an inspiration for activism against hate. Following
his death and inspired by Shepard’s passion to foster a more caring and just
world, Shepard’s parents created the Matthew Shapard Foundation mission is
for "individuals to embrace human dignity and diversity" and "to
replace hate with understanding, compassion and acceptance."
