Yesterday, El Universal (one of the national newspapers most important in Venezuela), published a news article to share with you below. I find it interesting to make it known because it is a portrait of human rights violations suffered by gender diverse community in Venezuela, against which the state turns a blind eye and society ignored or justified because "that was sissy shit that killed" . Anyway, I hope you enjoy it and take it with the seriousness of the case:
HATE CRIMES
"A Luis Enrique Montilla, they say, gave several bullets. But that was not enough: also cut his throat with a kitchen knife and threw him to an open grave in an old cemetery Barinas. He was accompanied by his friend Baudilio Gallardo Bastidas. Both 18, hair stylist by trade. Gallardo tried to flee. Worse for him. Was shot in the abdomen. Their victims were not satisfied with so little, they cut his neck with the same edge. It was not enough: it on fire as he lay dying.
Above them a regional newspaper said: " The Canyon community was alarmed by the discovery of the bodies of two young men with effeminate tendency . One way to clarify a little awkward that they were homosexuals. Their parents reported them missing to the police as a science: the living were last seen Jan. 11. Four days later the family found the bodies in the cemetery Pueblo Viejo, in Canyon.
The matter was resolved as follows: Erik Mike Sepulveda, 19, orchestrated the ambush and the double murder helped by five accomplices, two children among them. The argument over a debt of 400 Bolivars explains the issue and the arrest of the murderers, including a photo of the knife-closed the case for law enforcement purposes.
Rodrigo Duran knew him as Xiomara. A friend saw how it all happened: both were on the Avenida Libertador, Caracas, doing sex work. First they spent a few policemen who were told a few things: as always, the insults. Hours later, from a private car one man shouted as much. What is common: to be insulted and respond.
After a while he returned the same subject. He stopped the car. He beckoned the call. Xiomara thought it might be a customer. Calculated very badly shot six times, spent 11 days in agony, was no problem in meeting strangers in some intensive care and died, finally, during an operation in hospital Pérez de León on 18 May 2009.
Chantal witnessed the murder: there was no theft, there was a regular customer who returned annoying. There was only lead. But no one dared to complain, or to explain how was the perpetrator. Vanished. For months he did not return to the Liberator. But you have to work and that is the best place. He had to return. On January 14, 2010, close to PDVSA, was killed by a bullet. She was alone. Not stolen. Nobody outside the CICPC, knows the status of the investigation. In fact, it is not known whether there has been such an investigation. Specifically: Yonatan Matheus, director general of the NGO Venezuela Diversa has tried to inform him about it. It was in vain.
addition to the obvious horror and sexual orientation of their hapless protagonists, these stories have one common element in their treatment should be considered criminal police and the term "hate crime " above as easy to dispatch out as "reckoning." And that factor is not handled, among other things, does not exist on Venezuelan law.
" is a category that refers to aggression and crimes committed against a person and are related to prejudice the attacker who may be religious, racial, nationality or sexual orientation and gender identity, real or perceived . The explanation is Tamara Adrian, a lawyer and activist for the rights of sexual diversity. The concept includes everything contained in the Penal Code. That is, not just murders.
So what defines Tolerance and Non-Discrimination Information System (mutandis): "They are criminal acts whose motive is prejudice. This motive is what makes hate crimes different from other crimes. Include verbal intimidation and even physical violence or damage to property. The term refers more to a type of crime, or phenomenon, that a specific crime. It is not a legal definition and not all criminal justice systems recognize them. Hate crimes have two elements: a crime and a reason prejuicial. No crime no hate crime. No reason prejuicial is an ordinary crime. The perpetrator always chooses his victim for membership (real or perceived) in a specific group (ethnic, religious, sexual, disabled, etc.).
aggravating the condition
So far this year have identified at least 4 murders that could be treated as hate crimes. In the list are the two young men Barinas. Second Angel also Pirela, 19, transvestite. He called himself Angela, a student hairdresser perhaps to leave the street. He was found dead in Maracaibo on 18 January. Sin, cheek and head around the bullet entered.
Registration is not complete. Rises only with what is published in the press or the street commentary. Problems, many: families tend to avoid the attention that the orientation is not known sexual victims. But without enough staff or resources, and despite the secrecy that is already the norm in the CICPC, Venezuela Diversa was seven cases in 2009. The Stephanie Sasha (Carlos Velasquez), 28, transgender, is one. At 6 pm on the streets of Los Cedros Caracas urbanization of Florida, was shot in the head left her dead.
Friday morning, July 3, 2009 found the body of Jhon Carlos Molina Morales Santiago Mariño behind the Polytechnic in San Cristobal, first thought it was a lady, said the noted regional events. Until it was found " a transformer serving at night." Another awkwardness of language that reflects part of the problem: what is "transformed" Molina? was shot. Like almost all of the inventory.
Should we assume that all murders of homosexuals, transvestites and transgender hate crimes? Tamara Adrian explained that there is a sort of international convention on the subject: " If a person gay, transgender, lesbian, gender diversity, is murdered, until proven otherwise the police hypothesis must assume that it is a hate crime and must be alert to the presence of elements of that nature. The problem here is that not considered a motive for the hatred. And if not investigated there is not much you can do .
trivial matters, charging bias, possibly related to fanatical groups, presence of particular signs, and especially running with a vengeance. These are some aspects that, although they vary from one fact to another, help to identify that it is a hate crime.
Barinas What shoes as an example: " That was a crime hate, "says José Ramón Merentes, Venezuela Affirmative Union " Shows obvious signs of contempt for the victims: beheaded, burned one another buried."
Venezuela LGBTI Network, which brings together diverse groups organized lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex, has sought national legislation to recognize the existence of hate crimes. In fact, they reiterated their formal application to the National Assembly in document of 22 February 2011 (see Note) - to reform the criminal provisions include the definition of hate crime as an aggravating generic to all crimes. They further request to appoint a Special Committee on Sexual Diversity in the NA.
Tamara Adrian, network policy, said last November that tried to get a right to speak before the committee of MEPs discussing the reform of the Penal Code: " No answer."
The approach is not isolated. This aspect is inserted inside the aspiration to eliminate what they see as " segregation laws on grounds of sexual orientation or gender identity ." The murder is the final link where it ends a long chain of events associated with discrimination and prejudice.
Diversa Venezuela began documenting cases in 2008 following the death of José Eduardo Aranda, known for its "corporate name", Arant: Merida, a bullet. " We have a HIV prevention program with the girls at the Libertador Avenue. And here we are with problems: beatings, police harassment," says Matheus: "Violence against them has increased and that no spoken. It tries to justify this violence and abuse by the type of work they do, but do not take into account their human rights. What they do is to criminalize and socially justify the aggression. They refuse to recognize them as hate crimes. So we started the record, to visualize this situation .
Daniel Marquez, Venezuela Alternative Union, warns: "There a special address on the Ombudsman's Office or the Prosecutor's Office handle these cases. In the Metropolitan Municipality had an office where they received care for LGBTI complaints, but eliminated leaving Mayor Juan Barreto .
The only instance, then, no longer exists. A study done in 2008 by Citizen Action Against AIDS, showed that 50% of respondents had been assaulted by police or by private bodies because of their status as LGBTI. 89% of assaults are not reported: 45% do not distrust the system by 28% because of fear or shame. It is estimated that this scenario is worse today. "The few complaints are made are not processed with separate category," says Adrian, " Many are categorized as common criminals or crime of passion. And that is a form of invisible the problem."
" not all hate crime ends in death, "says Matheus. So it is up-or trying-to harassment and mistreatment of people of" sexual diversity ". In his travels through Caracas Venezuela team Diversa is reason for alarm. For example: the homophobia of law enforcement is compounded by the private guards in shopping malls that harass with impunity. " there an effort to criminalize being gay ." From of this idea remains little to link the chain " verbal, physical, abuse of authority, extortion, and eventually death .
Author: Oscar Medina
