Mother of slain son urges gays to unite against discrimination:Shepard pri

[NVMojo]

Shepard principal speaker during weeklong event at Lake Tahoe

STATELINE -- Judy Shepard, whose gay son was beaten to death five years ago, says gays and lesbians need to present a united front against discrimination of any sort.

"Hate is not a gay thing. It's everywhere. We need to take care of each other," she told a gathering of primarily gay people Wednesday night.

"You're being denied rights because people don't know anything about you. You have to let them know who you are."

Shepard, whose 21-year-old son Matthew was murdered in Wyoming in 1998, was the principal speaker during the weeklong "Ascent: The Winter Party at Lake Tahoe" sponsored by the Lake Tahoe Gay Lesbian Foundation.

It's the first of two back-to-back gay and lesbian skiing and entertainment events this month at Tahoe's casino-lined south shore. WinterFest, sponsored by a Reno-based group, opens Sunday, the final day of Ascent.

more...

http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2005/Mar-04-Fri-2005/news/25989268.html

[The Backlash Cometh]

1. Oh, honey. DU would make you proud.

They're getting more organized and bolder. And I'm inclined to believe they can take this administration down with the secrets they could tell.

[NVMojo]

2. I feel for this woman and everyone touched by this heinous crime...

[NNN0LHI]

3. My cousin was one of the treating physicians for Matthew ...

...at the emergency room he was transported to. He also treated one of the perps. Small world.

Don

http://www.ivinsonhospital.org/physicians/physicians_cantway.html

http://www.advocate.com/html/specials/shepard/laramie1028.asp

<snip>Rerucha put a number of medical witnesses on the stand, including Donald Cantway, MD, the local emergency room doc who first treated Matthew Shepard. Cantway also treated Aaron McKinney the same night, October 7, after one of the tire slashers slugged McKinney in the head with a wooden bat.

Though Cantway served largely as a foundation witness, his testimony outlined the severity of Shepard’s beating. He also told the court that McKinney said he hadn’t been drinking and that his blood-alcohol level was undetectable. The defense claims McKinney was out of his mind on drugs and booze for days before he met Shepard. Unfortunately for the prosecution, the emergency room didn’t administer a urine test.

Jason Tangeman used every medical witness to question the number of bruises on Shepard’s body, but Cantway was no help. Tangeman hopes to prove that some of the bruises on Shepard’s arms and thighs came from nurses’ pinching to test for pain response. Cantway said that local emergency room tests are administered by doing something called the “sternum rub” and pinching the Achilles tendon—the wrong body parts for Tangeman.

Tangeman also questioned Cantway about Shepard’s ability to feel “cognitive” pain. Tangeman had told jurors in his opening on Monday that Shepard couldn’t have suffered too much because he was comatose long before the cops found him tied to that fence (18 hours). Cantway obliged. He said Shepard scored the same as “dead” on response tests.

more

[NVMojo]

4. heinous is too simple of a word for such human sickness ...

[xchrom]

5. thank you for posting this.

i don't think i need to add any commentary here.

[NVMojo]

6. I understand, let's keep this kicked in his honor today...

[Ian David]

7. Score for Gay Rights as Kansas Deals Phelps a One-Two Punch

Score for Gay Rights as Kansas Deals Phelps a One-Two Punch

(Topeka, KS) — The Rev. Fred Phelps Sr., known for staging protests and anti-gay pickets with his church’s membership across the nation, was dealt a major blow yesterday when an effort on his part to repeal a Topeka ordinance protecting gays from discrimination failed.

Phelps, who gained national attention for picketing the funeral of Matthew Shepherd after he was severely beaten to death, urged city officials to remove from the books a city ordinance that prohibits discrimination against gays in municipal hiring.

The repeal, which was denied by 53-percent of voters, would have barred Topeka from reinstating such protections for 10 years.

The granddaughter of Phelps, 20-year-old nursing student Jael Phelps, suffered the second blow when she lost a bid for a seat on the city council to openly lesbian councilwoman Tiffany Muller in a nonpartisan primary.

More:
http://www.proudparenting.com/page.cfm?typeofsite=snippetdetail&ID=1810&snippetset=yes

[NVMojo]

8. definitely a score against the evilhaters...