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The Washington Post

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January 31, 1996, Wednesday, Final Edition

SECTION: A SECTION; Pg. A01

LENGTH: 1759 words

HEADLINE: Gays Fear Texas Slaying Reflects Trend; Anti-Homosexual Violence Has Risen Sharply, Advocacy Groups Say

BYLINE: Sue Anne Pressley, Washington Post Staff Writer

DATELINE: KATY, Tex.

BODY:

Fred Mangione was bleeding to death. His eyes were open -- bright and clear -- but who knows what he could see? Ken Stern held his old friend tightly, begging him to breathe, hoping he could feel, in this final, awful moment, that he was not alone.

With an act of baffling violence, the couple's life together -- 16 years of "marriage," as they used to joke -- came to a sad and shocking close.

Mangione, 46, was fatally stabbed on Jan. 4 in a parking lot outside a neighborhood bar named Dolly's Place. It was a spot where he and Stern, 42, had always felt comfortable and welcome, and that night, Stern recalled, they felt no reason to fear the two young men who struck up a conversation.

Later, however, police learned that half-brothers Daniel Christopher Bean, 19, and Ronald Henry Gauthier, 21, had told other patrons of Dolly's that evening that they were planning to "hurt a fag." They were members, they told police, of a neo-Nazi group called the German Peace Corps.

"It's very clear it was a hate crime," said Capt. Don McWilliams of the Harris County Sheriff's Department. "They've shown no remorse over the act. It appears very clear they did precisely what they intended to do."

Although the suspects lived in Montana and were only visiting their mother in this Houston suburb over the holidays, the crime has become another blemish on the reputation of a state already condemned for a recent spate of attacks on gay men and women. But officials with gay advocacy groups stress that this is not just a Texas problem. In a national climate of increasingly ugly rhetoric, they said, hate crimes against gays are on an alarming rise.

"Anti-gay rhetoric has its consequence in violence," said Matt Foreman, executive director of the New York City Gay and Lesbian Anti-Violence Project. "If you're preaching from a pulpit or a political forum, if you're saying that gays and lesbians are immoral, evil pederasts recruiting children, and then don't anticipate and expect violence, then that is absurd. For the younger people, the ones responsible for most of this [violence], the message is clear: We are not fully human."

Compiling a record of hate crimes against gays remains a frustratingly sketchy endeavor. In the past, victims so feared exposure that many of these crimes went underreported, but that has begun to change as anger at being targeted replaces such worries. But police often do not categorize anti-gay incidents as hate crimes, and seldom is evidence of intent as clear as in the Mangione slaying. Still, in the past few years, disturbing statistics have emerged.

According to the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, based in Washington, there has been nearly a 100 percent increase nationally in anti-gay homicides between 1992, when 30 were confirmed, and 1994, when the number reached 59. During that period, 10 such deaths were documented in Texas, 10 in Colorado, 9 in California, 8 in North Carolina, 17 in the Washington metropolitan area and 28 in New York City alone, according to the Anti-Violence Project.

Foreman attributed the high number of deaths in the Washington area to the sprawling geographical region that is involved, spanning from Anne Arundel County, Md., to Fairfax County, Va., and the fact that the capital area is home to the second-largest population of gay men on the East Coast. There have been disputes between Washington-area police and the task force over which cases constitute hate crimes.

Foreman's group also has tracked lesser acts of violence against homosexuals for the past 10 years and, he said, "the trend has been ever upward." Last year, in nine U.S. cities surveyed by the group, 2,064 anti-gay incidents were reported.

"We're not reporting somebody just saying 'faggot,' " Foreman said. "This is when a weapon is displayed, a bottle is thrown. . . . But the vast majority of violent acts against gays, maybe 75 percent of them, are not reported to anyone."

Bean and Gauthier did not fit the stereotype of skinheads in jackboots. By most accounts, they looked like many young men in their late teens or early twenties, with longish hair and a studiedly shabby appearance, although deputies said Bean's stark black goatee gave him a devilish look. Little is known about their pasts, McWilliams said. Police in their home town of Columbia Falls, Mont., said the pair had no previous record. The young men told police they were unemployed and had no information to offer about the German Peace Corps beyond their boasts of membership.

According to McWilliams, the group is loosely organized, based in California and known to the FBI. Rolando Bass, a spokesman for the FBI in Houston, would say only that the FBI is investigating the hate group connection.

Whatever brought Bean and Gauthier to the strip shopping center that housed Dolly's that night, it led one of them to carry a very sharp knife with a six-inch blade.

Ken Stern always considered himself the streetwise half of the couple, and he felt no danger, nothing threatening, from the young men at the bar. Mangione, as usual, was up to his old high jinks, laughing and talking and calling everyone "honey."

In this anonymous suburb west of Houston, where one fast-food restaurant blends into another, Stern and Mangione had managed an unusual popularity. At Community Bank, at the pancake house, at Dolly's, where they were the designated gay couple among a largely heterosexual clientele, their appearance usually was greeted with cries of, "Here come Kenny and Fred!"

"People come into your life and they touch you," said Suzie Andrews, 33, an office manager who had known the couple for several years. "They showed us a great deal. We were even aware at the time of how much they were showing us -- the longevity of their relationship, how much love and togetherness they shared. They were like an old married couple."

The two men had met in their native New Jersey in the late 1970s. They worked across the street from each other, and as time passed, although Mangione was married and Stern had recently broken up with a girlfriend, their friendship blossomed into a more intimate relationship.

Ten years ago, in search of a warmer climate, Stern and the then-divorced Mangione moved to Katy, bought a home, found jobs in the restaurant industry and made room in their house for both of their ailing mothers. A running joke with the two men became the joys and difficulties of dealing with "the Moms," or "the kids," as they often referred to the two elderly women.

"Fred and I used to go to bingo," said Stern's mother, Julia Stern, 67. "Kenny would always say, 'Oh, you two, when are you going to stop?' He'd lie down on the couch and watch TV, and we'd run off and play."

Stern and Mangione knew their openness had its drawbacks, but they felt safe in Katy, if not elsewhere in Texas. They avoided the Montrose section of Houston, where the city's gay community is centered. They were not activists, but they knew that trouble could surface at any time.

After all, in recent years, a harsh spotlight had been aimed at hate crimes against gays in Texas, attention that Foreman, of the Anti-Violence Project, said was somewhat unfairly focused.

"All across the country, gay men and some lesbians are being found, sometimes on a weekly basis, hideously murdered," he said. "One of the reasons Texas has gotten this attention is that, gratefully, in Texas, the perpetrators are usually apprehended. By and large, they are never caught [elsewhere], but in Texas, you have perps whose motives are known."

Still, 1994 was a year of shocking attacks. At least eight gay men in Texas were brutally murdered. They included Mike Burzinski, 29, who was abducted outside a gay bar in Montrose by four teenage boys, then beaten and shot to death; Leopoldo Quintanilla, 29, whose body was found in a field near Irving with his throat and genitals cut; and Randall Tubb, in his forties, who was shot to death in White Oak by four teenage boys who said they were "queer hunting."

"Most of the people who committed these crimes were young men," said Dianne Hardy-Garcia, executive director of the Lesbian-Gay Rights Lobby of Texas. "They were taught to hate somewhere."

Attorneys appointed by the court to defend Bean and Gauthier did not return telephone calls seeking comment about the case. McWilliams, of the Harris County Sheriff's Department, said the brothers told a patrol officer who stopped them as they ran across the street covered in blood, moments after the slaying, that Mangione had made a sexual advance. "Where we come from, men don't do that," the officer reported them as saying.

Looking back, Stern said he was grateful for that final evening with his longtime partner. There was no bickering over "the Moms," and a post-holiday-season peace seemed to cloak the world. They strolled through a nearly empty local mall and discussed plans to spend Valentine's Day, alone, at Disney World.

Eventually, they made their way to Dolly's. Bean and Gauthier were already there.

At some point after midnight, Stern and Mangione said they were going to drive to a nearby store and buy cigarettes, and the two young men asked if they could come along. When they returned, Stern walked into Dolly's, assuming Fred and the others were following. Then, according to Stern, things began to happen brutally fast. Suddenly, he said, the young men appeared and began to attack him, trying to cut him with a knife as he struggled to get free. Bar patrons pulled them away.

As Stern, shocked and shaken, picked himself up, a horrible thought flashed through his head: Where was Fred?

He ran outside and found Mangione in a pool of blood, stabbed 35 times.

A prayer vigil was held recently for Fred Mangione in Dolly's parking lot. Mourners stood in a big circle, holding hands and softly crying. Stern cried a little, too, but his numbness was starting to give way to anger.

He had just read, he said, that bond had been set at $ 1 million in a case involving the illegal slaughter of a buffalo in south Texas. So far, bail has been denied to the half-brothers who killed his dearest companion, but Stern still worries that somehow they'll get out.

"I don't want Texas to be known as a place where livestock is worth more than a citizen," Stern said. "I don't want to see these guys ever get bail. I want it to be a hundred million dollars. I want the highest bail ever."

"I know a buffalo is endangered," he said, "but I only had one Fred."

GRAPHIC: Photo, ap, Ken Stern, left, is comforted by his mother, Julia Stern, and co-worker Patti Gundersen, after making funeral arrangements for Fred Mangione.

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH

LOAD-DATE: January 31, 1996

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The Seattle Times

October 17, 1998, Saturday Final Edition

SECTION: NEWS; Pg. A3

LENGTH: 682 words

HEADLINE: SLAYING WOULD SEEM TO BE THE BIGGEST GAY NEWS STORY OF ALL TIME'

BYLINE: BROOKS EGERTON; THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS

BODY:

Ten teenagers, wielding pipes and nail-studded boards, mauled Paul Broussard on a city street. Two members of a neo-Nazi group lured Fred Mangione from a suburban tavern and stabbed him 35 times. Three men ambushed Thanh Nguyen as he snacked in a park; yelling slurs they beat, robbed, stripped and finally shot him.

The victims, all slain in recent years, were gay men out in public with gay friends. Their convicted killers, authorities say, were driven by hatred of gays and picked their targets at random.

And though just as vicious as Matthew Shepard's murder in Wyoming, none of these cases caused a national outcry. Experts who track hate crimes say they've never seen a gay victim inspire the reaction they've seen to the image of a diminutive college kid lashed to a fence: presidential pleas for hate-crimes legislation, a far-flung series of candlelight vigils, rallies on the steps of the U.S. Capitol, and a funeral played prominently on network newscasts.

San Diego journalist Rex Wockner, who compiles gay-related news and disseminates it online to hundreds of editors, called the situation unprecedented. "Suffice it to say this would seem to be the biggest gay news story of all time," he wrote.

In explaining the outpouring, people on opposing sides of the country's debate over homosexuality agree on this much: Gays and lesbians seem more visible, more human, than ever before - and so inhumanity packs a powerful new wallop.

Gays appear in the media no longer just as flamboyant spectacle, but also as soldiers and athletes and Republicans. The question is not their presence but their rights: Should they be allowed to serve openly in the military? Get married? Get ordained? Sue for job discrimination?

"Even 10 years ago, and certainly 20 years ago, talking about homosexuals was in many instances a theoretical discussion," said Dr. C. Welton Gaddy, a Baptist preacher from Louisiana who heads the gay-friendly Interfaith Alliance in Washington, D.C. "Now when we talk about gays and lesbians, we're talking about individuals with whom we work and with whom we worship.

"Even people who have moral questions about homosexuality have friends who are gay."

A spokeswoman for the Family Research Council, sponsor of a national advertising campaign that promotes conversion therapy for gays and lesbians, concurred.

"There is a heightened awareness of who's homosexual and who's not," said Heather Farish. "It might be a mother or brother or sister or daughter."

Wayne Besen, spokesman for the gay advocacy group Human Rights Campaign, put it this way: "Matthew became a symbol because the boy next door was hung up like a scarecrow. People saw him as their son or little brother."

The timing of his death Monday has fed the fires of grief and reaction: It came as Congress was considering a bill making it easier for federal prosecutors to tackle hate-crime cases, and just four months after another horrific killing made national news - that of a Jasper, Texas, black man who authorities say was dragged to his death and beheaded by white supremacists.

Shepard "captured our imagination the way James Byrd did," Besen said.

Besen's organization has accused conservatives of fomenting hatred of gays in recent months, citing everything from the conversion ads to top congressional Republicans' denunciations of homosexuality as sin and addiction.

"They create a climate and environment of intolerance and give license to those who seek to vent their rage or frustration on an entire community," Human Rights Campaign Executive Director Elizabeth Birch said Wednesday.

Farish vehemently rejects such allegations. "Don't blame AA because a drunk was beat up," she said.

Farish said gay activists are making too much of Shepard and his death. "We mourn for him as well," she said, "but we also mourn that he's being used."

Responds William Waybourn, a Washington public-relations consultant who has led Dallas and national gay-rights groups: "This community is not looking for martyrs - but handed them, we certainly use them."

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH

LOAD-DATE: October 18, 1998

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The Houston Chronicle

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July 1, 1997, Tuesday, 3 STAR Edition

SECTION: a; Pg. 14

LENGTH: 461 words

HEADLINE: Convicted murderer placed on short leash;

Judge imposes strict probation conditions

BYLINE: STEFANIE ASIN; Staff

BODY:

A 23-year-old man convicted of murder in the slaying of a gay

man was forbidden Monday from having any contact with his

half-brother, imprisoned in the same case.

The prohibition was one of several strict probation conditions

imposed on Ronald Henry Gauthier, convicted of murder Friday

for his role in the stabbing death of Fred Mangione.

The jury sentenced Gauthier to 10 years probation. A juror

said the panel believed the state had not proved that Gauthier

was in the van where Mangione was killed.

Gauthier's half-brother, Daniel Bean, is serving a life

sentence for stabbing Mangione 35 times in the van parked

outside a Katy bar.

State District Judge Werner Voigt also ordered that Gauthier

stay in jail until he can enroll in Harris County boot camp,

which could be as long as five months from now; complete 1,000

hours of community service; write a letter of apology to

Mangione's lover and to the citizens of Harris County; pass a

high school equivalency test; attend community college; work;

stay more than 150 feet from Mangione's lover; stay away from

hate groups; and stay away from guns and knives.

Prosecutor Randy Ayers said the judge made it clear to

Gauthier that if he slips up while on probation, Voigt will

send him to jail.

""These conditions are about as tough as you can get,'' Ayers

said. ""I have a feeling he's going to have some trouble down

the line. ''

Ayers said he hopes Gauthier doesn't hurt anybody again, but

he hopes he does end up in jail.

Ayers said he asked for the ban on contact with Bean, who

reportedly is involved in a white supremacist group in prison.

The two are close friends.

""I knew it would be a punishment for him,'' Ayers said.

Defense attorney John Donahue said the no-contact rule is the

toughest condition for his client, who would like to visit his

brother. Donahue said he is confident that Gauthier will

successfully complete his probation, but said the conditions

were not easy.

Writing the apology letters also will be difficult, he said.

His client still claims he had nothing to do with killing

Mangione.

On Jan. 4, 1996, Gauthier and Bean met Mangione and his

longtime companion, Kenneth Stern, at a bar called Dolly's

Place in Katy.

The four went to a convenience store to get cigarettes. When

they returned, testimony showed, Stern went into the bar and

soon afterward, Gauthier ran in and beat him. Shortly after

that, Bean ran in with a bloody deer-gutting knife, which he

left on the counter.

As the two ran away from the bar, a constable stopped them. He

testified that Bean told him, ""We just (expletive) a fag. ''

Stern said Friday that he was afraid of Gauthier getting

probation because they live in the same neighborhood.

GRAPHIC: Mug: Ronald Henry Gauthier

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH

LOAD-DATE: July 2, 1997

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The Houston Chronicle

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June 28, 1997, Saturday, 3 STAR Edition

SECTION: a; Pg. 1

LENGTH: 881 words

HEADLINE: Probation given for role in murder;

Defendant convicted in gay man's slaying

BYLINE: STEFANIE ASIN; Staff

BODY:

A jury sentenced a man to 10 years probation Friday after

convicting him of murder for his role in the slaying of a gay

man who was stabbed 35 times.

The jury convicted Ronald Henry Gauthier, 23, at about 4 p.m.

after 10 hours of deliberations. The panel then had to decide

punishment that could range from probation to life in prison.

It took about an hour for the jury to sentence Gauthier to

probation for taking part in the killing of Fred Mangione on

the night of Jan.4, 1996. Gauthier's half-brother, Daniel

Bean, who stabbed Mangione 35 times with a deer-gutting knife,

is serving a life prison term in the case.

A juror, Barbara Mitchell, said the panel assessed probation

despite the murder conviction because jurors did not believe

the state proved Gauthier was an active participant in the

killing.

However, under the law, the jury was required to convict him

because he was a party to the crime, Mitchell said.

Gauthier rejoiced with his family after the sentence was

read.

""I have God to thank for this one,'' he said as he left the

courthouse in handcuffs.

Gauthier has been in jail since he was arrested in January

1996. He was to be released Friday night, and state District

Judge Werner Voigt will set the terms of his probation on

Monday.

Kenneth Stern, Mangione's longtime lover, who was with him on

the night of the slaying, expressed dismay at the sentence.

""If they find him guilty of at least being there, how do they

let him walk the streets? '' asked Stern, who had been involved

with Mangione for 16 years.

Stern said he is frightened because Gauthier lives with his

mother in the Katy subdivision next to Stern's.

""For the rest of my life,'' he said, ""I have to watch what he

does. ''

Lane Lewis, president of the Houston Gay and Lesbian Political

Caucus, said the probated sentence was unjust.

""If the two men were together, then in my opinion they were

equally as guilty,'' Lewis said. ""It makes it even more heinous

when the murder is based simply on bigotry and ignorance. ''

Lewis predicted some ""spillover reaction'' this weekend when

members of the gay community celebrate with the Houston Gay

and Lesbian Pride Parade.

On the night of the killing, Bean and Gauthier were in a bar

called Dolly's Place, where Mangione and Stern were having

drinks.

After Mangione began selling Avon products to some of the

patrons he knew, a stranger began cursing at him because he

was gay, court records indicate.

Testimony showed that Bean and Gauthier talked to the man and

calmed him down. Witnesses said Gauthier told the man that

they were going to mess with the ""fags. ''

Later, Bean and Gauthier got a ride with Stern and Mangione to

a convenience store to buy cigarettes.

When they returned, Stern went into the bar. A few minutes

later, witnesses said, Gauthier ran in and began beating

Stern. Behind him was Bean, who dropped a bloody knife on the

bar countertop.

Bean and Gauthier ran out of the bar and soon were stopped by

a constable, who asked what they are doing. The officer

testified that Bean told him, ""We just (expletive) a fag. ''

Mangione's body was found in his van.

""Fred was killed because he was gay,'' Prosecutor Randy Ayers

said.

But the defendant testified that he was not in the van when

Mangione was killed and was unaware of what had transpired.

""I had no idea what Dan had done,'' Gauthier told the jury.

Gauthier said he left the van frightened after Mangione

offered his brother cocaine if he would expose himself to him.

The defendant said he ran into the bar for help and hit Stern

when he refused to help.

Ayers tried to convince the jury that Gauthier held the victim

down while his brother stabbed him in the legs and lower

back.

""A little gay bashing, that's what they were doing,'' he said.

Ayers likened the defendant and his brother to wolves who

stalked Mangione in the bar because he was gay. The prosecutor

asked the jury to sentence Gauthier to prison time.

Trial testimony linked the brothers to a hate group called the

German Peace Corps. Gauthier denied being a member, although

Bean had the group's initials tattooed on his arm.

On cross-examination, Gauthier admitted that he first told

police that Mangione came at them with a knife and they had to

protect themselves. He said that was a lie he made up to

protect his half-brother.

A former Houston police crime lab director testified that

Gauthier could not have been in the van because no blood was

on his shirt or jacket. Blood was smeared on the lower part of

his jeans, however.

Bean's clothes were covered in blood, and so was the van.

The juror, Mitchell, said the former crime lab director's

testimony influenced the jury's punishment decision.

Defense attorney John Donahue told the jury that his client

could not have been in the van without getting blood on his

shirt.

In the punishment phase, Donahue asked for probation and

emphasized to the jury that there was no proof that his client

was in the van.

Gauthier's mother testified in the punishment phase of the

trial, telling the jury she didn't think her son was guilty.

She said her son was well-liked, calm and quiet - quite

different from his half-brother.

GRAPHIC: Photo: 1. Ronald Henry Gauthier reacts outside court after receiving probation Friday (color); Mug: 2. Fred Mangione in 1981 (b/w, p. 17); 1. D. Fahleson/Chronicle

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH

LOAD-DATE: June 30, 1997

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The Houston Chronicle

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June 24, 1997, Tuesday, 3 STAR Edition

SECTION: a; Pg. 14

LENGTH: 294 words

HEADLINE: Murder trial testimony cites attack, slaying of homosexual

BYLINE: STEFANIE ASIN; Staff

BODY:

Jurors in a murder trial heard testimony Monday from a man

whose lover was stabbed 35 times because he was gay.

The testimony came on the first day of the trial of Ronald

Henry Gauthier, 23, who is accused of helping his half-brother

kill Fred Mangione, 46. The co-defendant, Daniel Bean, has

been sentenced to life in prison for the crime.

The victim's lover, Kenneth Stern, told the jury about the

night of Jan. 4, 1996, when he and Mangione went to a

neighborhood bar in Katy called Dolly's Place. The two had

been companions for 16 years.

In the bar, Mangione started selling Avon products and a

drunken man yelled out that someone should whip ""those fags,''

testimony showed.

Witnesses said Bean and Gauthier then talked to the man who

had shouted and soon befriended Mangione and Stern. A short

time later, they left together to go to the store to buy

cigarettes.

When they returned, Stern left the van they were riding in and

went into the bar. Minutes later, Gauthier ran into the bar

and began beating Stern as he sat on a bar stool, witnesses

said.

Soon after that, Bean walked in with a long, bloody,

deer-gutting knife and threw it on the bar. After a scuffle,

the two men fled and bar patrons went to check on Mangione.

They found his body in the van with 35 stab wounds in the

legs.

Police found Bean and Gauthier, who were visiting the Houston

area, running in the parking lot. Bean's clothing was bloody,

said prosecutor Randy Ayers.

When the officer asked them what they had been doing, they

told him they messed up a ""fag. ''

Also testifying in state District Judge Werner Voigt's court

were bar patrons who overheard conversations and saw the

beating in the bar.

Testimony continues today.

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH

LOAD-DATE: June 25, 1997

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The Houston Chronicle

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February 23, 1996, Friday, 3 STAR Edition

SECTION: a; Outlook; Pg. 31

LENGTH: 890 words

HEADLINE: Don't let hate crimes tarnish Houston's image

BYLINE: JONATHAN BERNSTEIN; Staff

BODY:

HAVE you been victimized by bigotry? The latest statistics

from the Texas Department of Public Safety and the

Anti-Defamation League indicate that hate crime and acts of

intimidation in Texas are no longer increasing. However, it

might not yet be time to celebrate. The welcome decline in

incidents does not mitigate the severity of the threats and

attacks that have occurred over the past few years. Hatred is

difficult to quantify. A growing percentage of incidents

target people as opposed to property. This means that we are

seeing more acts of harassment, threats, assault and even

murder.

These more confrontational forms of bigotry are of greater

concern than simply vandalism. Recently I was called by a

California business executive who was worried about moving to

Houston after reading that Fred Mangione was allegedly

murdered here simply for being gay. He reminded me that it was

not that long ago that Houstonian Tarron Dixon, a Persian Gulf

War veteran, was also murdered simply because he was an

African-American. The call raised my concerns about our city's

reputation. Some vicious hate crimes have occurred in our

community recently, giving people the impression that we are

collectively responsible for creating a climate in which these

attacks are condoned. Are we?

What makes hate crime different from other type of crimes is

the selection of the victim. Victims are chosen for attack

because they come from a particular background or belong to a

group that is stereotyped as inferior or scapegoated for

causing perceived problems. Mangione's accused killers claim

to have been members of a neo-Nazi skinhead gang. They

allegedly warned that they were going to ""get a fag'' before

stabbing Mangione 35 times.

Research shows that nearly all hate crime offenders do not

know the person they are attacking. They are not motivated by

any kind of animus toward the individual victim. Instead, they

are spurred by a fear of the unknown and misperceptions about

a group with which they have had little contact. Victims are

dehumanized by this distance. Typically, the offender travels

outside his or her neighborhood to commit the crime. If

members of one scapegoated group are not available, offenders

will find someone from another group.

Many social scientists have commented on the ""Balkanization''

of society. We are tending more and more to associate only

with individuals who look and speak just like us. This

increasing isolation has caused us to know less about other

people, creating a fertile environment for the formation of

stereotypes and friction. To counter a climate that could

incite hate crime, we need to venture outside our comfortable

and familiar surroundings and experience what it is like to be

different.

Strengthening Houston's image will also require all of us to

speak out forcefully against hate crime. The intent of the

offender is to build a sense of insecurity in the victim's

community. Thus, a message of tolerance is particularly

powerful when it comes from outside that community. Interfaith

Ministries deserves high praise for recently organizing a

demonstration of solidarity that brought together leaders from

diverse religious backgrounds at the site where Mangione was

murdered.

It is easy enough for us to blame a hate group for providing

the impetus for the murder of Mangione, even though the

suspects' involvement is such a group has not yet been

verified. However, we also need to recognize our own failure

in not doing more to counter stereotypes and displays of

prejudice than can legitimize the perpetrators' actions. The

best way to reject hatred is by continuously responding to

prejudicial attitudes whenever they are expressed.

This does not mean that every utterance should be monitored

for political correctness. Nor does this imply that someone

who says something that is potentially offensive should

necessarily be publicly condemned and ostracized. However,

bigotry ignored is bigotry condoned. The old childhood adage,

""Sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never

hurt me,'' is a lie. Words have consequences. Words can cause a

great deal of pain. We have seen how they can even motivate

some to murder.

Children in particular can be taught to respect and appreciate

diverse cultures and backgrounds. Stereotypes and prejudices

are not as ingrained in the consciousness of youngsters as

they are in adults. For this reason, 10 years ago the

Anti-Defamation League launched ""A World of Difference,'' a

program that provides educators with the training to better

manage intergroup understanding and help children confront

their own prejudices. Nationally, more than 250,000 teachers

have been trained who have in turn taught valuable lessons on

diversity to their students.

Houston has begun to recognize that its diverse population is

one of its greatest resources. However, being diverse is not

enough. We also need to learn how to manage that diversity. By

helping to develop a climate of tolerance, our community will

be less likely to suffer from the blemish of hate crimes.

Crimes of hate target specific victims and communities, but

the pain is felt by our friends, children, neighbors and

ourselves.

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH

TYPE: Editorial Opinion

NOTES: Bernstein is director of the Anti-Defamation League, Southwest Region, based in Houston.

LOAD-DATE: February 24, 1996

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The Times-Picayune

January 29, 1996 Monday, THIRD

SECTION: METRO; Pg. B5

LENGTH: 630 words

HEADLINE: ENFORCE LAWS TO CURB HATE CRIMES

BYLINE: By Deb Price

BODY:

Targeted. In accounts of violent hate crimes, that chilling, impersonal word underscores the reality that the human beings left bleeding were not random victims. They were chosen, singled out because of their attackers' prejudice.

"It's very obvious the victim was targeted because of the fact he was homosexual," a Texas police officer declared early this month. The victim, Fred Mangione, died in a Houston suburb after being stabbed 35 times. A pair of neo-Nazis, who'd allegedly boasted they were going to "get a fag," were quickly charged.

A West Palm Beach, Fla., jury last fall recommended the death penalty for the killer of 22-year-old Brendan Meehan, "who prosecutors say was targeted because he was gay," the Associated Press reported.

Three white-supremacist soldiers drove around Fayetteville, N.C., one night last month in search of black people, police say. Jackie Burden and her friend Michael James just happened be out strolling. Both were fatally shot in the head.

Oregon gay-rights activists Roxanne Ellis and her partner, Michelle Abdill, were murdered Dec. 4. "(Robert James) Acremant has said he chose the women as targets for robbery because they were lesbians, and their homosexuality made it easier to kill them." according to the Associated Press. Shooting the women, Acremant said, was "no different than shooting your chicken that just lost in a cockfight or putting your sick dog to sleep or shooting at tin cans."

Since 1990, the FBI has tracked hate crimes, counting attacks triggered by prejudice against the victim's race, religion, ethnicity or sexual orientation. Yet, as the FBI readily admits, its statistics are far from complete. Of 16,000 law enforcement agencies nationwide, only 7,200 complied with the voluntary reporting program in 1994, the most recent year for which figures are available.

Nevertheless, the FBI's partial account offers important clues about the nature of this national disgrace. Of the 5,852 hate crimes officially tallied in 1994, 60 percent were racial - usually anti-black. Eighteen percent targeted a religion, 12 percent a sexual orientation and 11 percent an ethnic group.

The vast majority of hate crimes are directed at people, not property. Yet in recorded attacks stemming from religious bigotry, anti-Semitic vandalism is the most common problem.

Anti-gay assaults tend to be especially vicious. In 1993, six of the 16 FBI-recorded hate murders claimed gay lives. The FBI hasn't yet broken down its homicide '94 figures, but independent calculations indicate that frightening pattern hasn't changed: Eleven of 18 hate killings were anti-gay, according to Klanwatch, a project of the Southern Poverty Law Center.

The biggest threat to us gay people comes from bored young guys out to get a few kicks by bashing something - whether a mailbox or a human head.

"Surprisingly, the offenders in thrill hate crimes are not particularly committed to prejudice. They frequently go along to please or be accepted by their friends," report Jack Levin and Jack McDevitt, authors of "Hate Crimes."

Such "recreational" attacks are "highly deterrable crimes," Klanwatch associate director Brian Levin says. Would-be attackers who see no evil in terrorizing someone simply for being, say, black or gay or Jewish must be warned that such anti-social behavior will be severely punished, he adds.

When properly crafted and enforced, hate crimes laws can broadcast that warning. But less than one-third of 47 state hate statutes explicitly cover anti-gay attacks.

By omission, most states are sending the deadly message that gay men and lesbians are safe targets.

Deb Price of The Detroit News' Washington bureau writes a gay-issues column.

1996, The Detroit News

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH

COLUMN: Deb Price

LOAD-DATE: January 31, 1996