Mike the Usurper wrote:
Given those circumstances, I agree, they should not. To give you a different set of circumstances, jackass A goes to rob a liquor store and in the process of the robbery, shoots and kills the owner. That's first degree murder + armed robbery + a host of other charges. Jackass B heads down to the gay section of whatever city they are in for the purpose of beating/killing someone, and does so. Still first degree murder.

The first case, absent a Sheppard rule, will get a stiffer sentence because of the surrunding circumstances, even though there was no original intent to commit murder. I am in favor of the Sheppard rule because intent matters.

Now if you want to complicate things and change situation A to guy goes out with the simple intent to kill someone, you're probably talking about a serial killer and at that point the whole thing is heading into something different.

The reality of most murders is, they are crimes of passion/rage. The killer and victim know each other and some incident has escalated. The vast majority of the rest are crimes committed in the course of other crimes like the robbery I describe above. Only a very few are cases like Sheppard or Byrd or Virginia Tech or Iowa 16 years ago or Son of Sam or Green River or Dahmer. Yet which get the most attention? Those very few. Why? Because intent (and body count) matter.

I agree. The intent is key but i think care should be taken when you change the sentence based on WHO is killed. I think it's understandable in cases of Police and such, but that mostly has to do with the cost in life and manpower that would be needed if everyone had no disincentive to resist the police. Let's say they change the hate crime bill to extend to everyone other than white straight men. Cutting it this way clearly shows the unfair discrimination. I can understand the need for tougher violence laws under some circumstances, but unless it's done with an even brush i think the cure is worse than the illness.

What if jackass B went to the gay section of town looking to kill, but couldn't find anyone walking the streets at that time of night. After some time he finds some homeless guy in a dumpster and figures he's good enough to kill. I don't believe killing homeless guy is significantly better than killing a gay person, or a minority. If it comes out during the trial that it was in fact a GAY homeless man, that should not affect sentencing. Under this law, it could.

More frequently, violence does not end in death. And even in these cases I think the circumstances of the act are more important than idiosyncrasies of the victim. Even if it was those idiosyncrasies which motivated the crime. The intent of harm for whatever reason is what needs to be addressed.

RE: Pass the Matthew Shepard Act...