Final Image?

Matthew Shepard's View of Laramie at Night

Jason Sudeikis gets it.

A little Westboro Baptist Church back in the news.




(Yes, I get all my news from Weekend Update.)

Resources from UW

Yay source material! And a lot of Philip DuBois.

"Fear and Loathing and The Laramie Project"

Here's this interesting blog I found written by a woman who was a freshman at the university in 1998, one of Matthew's classmates, who didn't know him personally but was deeply affected by the events and subsequently by "The Laramie Project."
This is how she starts her first entry:
I guess a good way of explaining why I felt the need to start a weblog about The Laramie Project would be with an anecdote. I was walking with a friend to grab some dinner a few weeks ago when he cheerfully replied to something I said with the quip, "Well, tie me to a fence and pistol-whip me." I felt like he slugged me in the stomach. To my friend, who is an out gay male, that image is little more than a cultural reference used just a little too casually among his like-minded friends. To me, I can't see that image in my head without seeing Matt Shepard's face right in front of me and revisiting everything that happened afterward. My friend had no clue how badly that quip shocked me because at the time, I had never told him that I was there.

Questions Re: Police Search

I'm trying to find out how they were able to get the gun from the car without a warrant...maybe someone else has more knowledge of this than me. But I found an account online (doesn't cite any sources, so who knows) that provides some details I hadn't heard before:

"The gun which was used to beat and murder Shepard, as well as being the suspected weapon on Morales, was found in McKinney's pick-up truck as were also found Matthew's credit card, coat and shoes. Shepards' wallet would later be discovered at McKinney's home wrapped in a dirty diaper in a garbage pail.
Officer Clint Waters, responding to a vandalism call, spotted Henderson and McKinney as they got out of a black pickup and crouched down. Waters turned on the patrol car's lights and the two men bolted in different directions. Waters tackled Henderson a half-block away when the young man was slowed by hedges in a back yard. Police said Waters found a bloody .357 Magnum in the back of the pick up and asked Henderson if it had been fired. According to police, Henderson lauged and said, "I guarantee you won't find anyone with a bullet in 'em." What police found was a badly beaten Shepard, who died five days later."

Matthew Shepard's Assailants

Recent Denver Post Article

"Matt Shepard needed killing," Aaron McKinney bluntly told Tectonic company member Greg Pierotti for the epilogue, which includes the first interviews with McKinney and Russell Henderson since 2004.

"As far as Matt is concerned, I don't have any remorse," McKinney said during nine hours of talks with Pierotti. "The night I did it, I did have hatred for homosexuals."

McKinney's initial motive was robbery. But he targeted Shepard, he said, because "he was obviously gay. That played a part. His weakness. His frailty."

McKinney now calls himself "the poster child for hate-crime murders."

Rest of article, mostly about Laramie: Ten Years Later

Also like the quote "Laramie is a community, not a project."

NY Times Archives for Laramie Project

"This archive republishes 17 New York Times articles about the murder of Matthew Shepard, who was beaten to death in Laramie, Wyoming, in 1998, as well as the trial of his two assailants and the nationwide debate about hate-crimes legislation that it provoked."