Crime and punishment?
T-Notes
by Robbi Cohn | August 22nd, 2009, 12:04 am

http://www.q-notes.com/3372/crime-and-punishment/

Forty one years after the first hate crime legislation was passed, and 11 years after Matthew Shepard's brutal murder, the U.S. Congress is poised to pass hate crime legislation. It's the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act (generally referred to as the Matthew Shepard Act) and the Senate version of the bill has been incorporated into a defense reauthorization bill. The House has already passed its version and it may well have gone for a vote before the Senate by the date of this publication.

Currently and recently we have witnessed three trials in three states being tried as hate crimes within the statutory guidelines of Colorado, New York and California, respectively. Angie Zapata, Teisha Green and Larry King were all slain by weapons wielded with malice by persons consumed with hatred.