Have you heard of Aaron C. Hall?

[Canadian Ninja1]

I really doubt that you have.

For those of you going too long; didn't read, let me sum this up for you. A man was brutally beaten for hours, dragged to a field, beaten some more, and left to die in April. His body wasn't found for ten days, and until a local paper ran the story in June, the general public, both nationally and locally, knew more or less nothing about the case.

The attacker's current defense is gay panic. Indiana is one of five states that do not have hate crime laws. Not only has the gay panic defense worked before, but it's completely legal in Indiana. Legislation against hate crimes that was proposed after a white suprematist's shooting spree in 1999 was quickly shot down.

But here's the real kicker; Hall's sexuality isn't exactly confirmed. The implications are one of two things. Either he was beaten to death because he was gay, or else his murderers are attempting to exhort a sick sympathy from homophobic jury members by portraying beating a man to death as a natural response to homosexuality.

Here's the real kicker. There are so few and far between reports, mainly of small-town newspapers about this. Indianapolis Star? Won't touch it. The Associated Press hasn't mentioned anything either. CNN is mysteriously absent.

In other words, a hate crime of this magnitude has been completely suppressed for two months.

What did Aaron Hall die for? And what will his murderers learn from their trial?

Will they learn that Indiana is a state where you can get away with murder, as long as you murder the right person in the right extenuating circumstances?

 

[LVTicklr]

That really sucks to hear that,for one would think that Matthew Sheppard's similar tragedy would spark the crackdown on hate crimes,for I hope that Aaron's killers get the book thrown at them for doing this.

 

[Journia]

Hmmm...How, unfortunate.

 

[Timewarp]

Dude...there have been many, many. MANY cases of murder that have gone unsolved or not known at all. It's not that no one cares...it's just people don't know and when they do...it is shocking. That's just life.

 

[Canadian Ninja1]

Dude...there have been many, many. MANY cases of murder that have gone unsolved or not known at all. It's not that no one cares...it's just people don't know and when they do...it is shocking. That's just life.

So because it's just life, it's easier to ignore something like this?

That's not the way I'm going about this.

 

[Timewarp]

You have to admit...not everyone is a special world changing man or woman. Sometimes were just average joe/joettes and that's something you just got to accept. Just run with it. Complaining on a board isn't much an effort, just about anyone can do it. Hence my rant series.

 

[Canadian Ninja1]

You have to admit...not everyone is a special world changing man or woman. Sometimes were just average joe/joettes and that's something you just got to accept. Just run with it. Complaining on a board isn't much an effort, just about anyone can do it. Hence my rant series.

I can accept that a lot of murders don't get coverage. I can accept that some particularly brutal murders don't get coverage. Hate crimes? No surprise there either.

But a particularly brutal murder against a gay man who may not have even been gay? This has sensationalist media bullshit written all over it. And while I'm not necessarily a fan of that, I have to wonder how even that hasn't happened yet.

Right now, I'm not trying to change the world. Right now, my goal is simply spreading the word that after all progress has been made, there's always someone or something acting against it. And if that, as you say, is life? I refuse to allow it to be covered up so easily.

 

[uttahcee1]

all crimes of viloence are hate crimes people should stop making one crime of viloence appear more hedenious than another that what get some people shorter jail terms and let these people out

 

[QueerEye4Cols]

The murderers father is the deputy coroner

One of the accused murderers, Garrett Gray (19), his father is the Deputy Coroner of the county the murder happened in. It was his fathers house where the beating occured, and where the body was later hidden wrapped in a tarp for 10 days. Sounds crooked to me...