9781422283813

14 FAC I NG HOMOPHOB I A

Henderson went to the bar bathroom and made a plan to pretend to be gay so as to get Shepard into the truck to rob him. McKinney and Henderson never denied that they’d committed the crime. McKinney pleaded the “gay panic defense,” claiming that he was so terrified by Matthew’s supposed sexual advances toward him that he was driven to temporary insanity. Henderson pleaded guilty without a trial. Their lawyers argued that because of the “gay panic defense” the two men were not responsible for their actions. Both McKinney and Henderson were found guilty of felony murder, making them eligible for the death penalty in Wyoming. What happened next surprised some. Matthew Shepard’s father made an emotional statement in the courtroom, asking that, in memory of his murdered son’s compassion, the judge sentence the killers to life imprisonment rather than impose the ultimate punish- ment of death. Tragically, the hate that caused Matthew’s death haunted his funeral at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church on October 16, 1998. Across the street from the church, members of the conservative-fringe Westboro Baptist Church carried signs that read “GOD HATES FAGS” and “MATT SHEPARD ROTS IN HELL.”

Anti-gay Hate Crimes

The death of Matthew Shepard and the trial of the young men who so brutally murdered him brought the issue of homophobia and its tragic