The Sickness of a Hate Crimes

Anyone who knows me, knows that I am from West Virginia. I represent my state loud and proud, and I literally bleed Blue and Gold as a Mountaineer fan. However, yesterday something went down in my state that made me feel angry and ashamed.

By now I am sure many of you have seen it. In Big Creek, West Virginia, about 30 minutes from where I grew up, a 20 year old Black woman named Megan Williams was kidnapped and tortured for at least a week by 4 individuals. She was beaten, had parts of her hair torn out and was mentally, physically and sexually abused. These monsters...I can't call them people....Blacked both of her eyes, stabbed her numerous times in her legs, forced her to eat rat and dog feces and drink from the toilet. They raped her. They called her nigger every time they stabbed ger. Thanks to a tip, police were finally able to find and free her.

The question is, what now? These people do not need to ever see the light of day. I cannot even imagine the level of misfortune that would need to come down upon them for Karma to balance this out.

Looking beyond the incident, we must as what can be done to properly punish acts like this so that there can be a deterrant effect. The logical action would be to make it easier for the Federal Government to get involved, which would bring greater resources in prosecution and stiffer penalties, including the death penalty (West Virginia does not currently have the death penalty).

18 U.S.C. § 245 is a federal statute that allows the federal government to step in and prosecute in situations where people by force or threat of force willfully injures, intimidates or interferes with any person because of his race, color, religion or national origin. However this law ONLY allows the Federal Government to step in where the person of color is exercising a federally protected right like voting or going to school. It does NOT current apply in situations like this. That means that these monsters can only be tried in state court, before potentially more biased jurors or judges who may be more sympathetic and assign lesser penalties.

In May of this year Congressman John Conyers took steps to remedy this and to get the Federal Government more involved in acts like this by proposing a bill called the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2007...This law would expand the Federal Government's ability to prosecute local hate crimes in ALL situations and give stiffer penalties for concivtions....It would also devote millions to the investigation of these crimes.

This bill passed the House of Representatives and currently sits in the Senate.....President Bush (surprise, surprise) has threatened to veto it.

In light of what has just happened in WV as well as other situations (The case in Georgia of the little boy named Christopher Barrios comes to mind) this law is needed....People who commit these acts of hate cannot get a slap on the wrist from local authorities...They need to be put away for good or in cases where they kill someone get the death penalty.

Everyone who is shocked by this story should contact their Senator and push them to vote for this bill....Hopefully there will be enough votes to override a veto....It may not help Megan Williams or Christopher Barrios, but it certainly will have an impact on the next young person who has their dignity or life taken because of the color of their skin get proper vindication for the wrongs done to them.

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h110-1592