On June 7, 1998, James Byrd Jr., 49, of Texas, agreed to be taken by three white men, who then severely beat him, urinated on him and chained him by the ankles. in the back of their pickup truck, dragged him three miles into the countryside and dumped his body in front of an African-American cemetery (Graczyk). A little over a year later, a jury sentenced the group's leader John King to death by lethal injection ("Man Executed for Dragging the Death of James Byrd"). Although this particular case may give the impression that hate crime perpetrators are receiving appropriate punishment, almost a decade later, one particular case demonstrates the inequity in the application of hate crime punishment: in 2007 , Sean Kennedy of Charleston, South Carolina, left a bar around 3:45 a.m. and was confronted by Stephen Moller, who called him a "faggot" and then punched him so hard in the face that the bones in his face shattered and he fell backward onto the sidewalk, fracturing his skull and dislocating his brain from the ground. brainstem. Kennedy was taken off life support later that day. Moller was initially charged with her death, but the charges were reduced to manslaughter unrelated to the hate crime, and he was sentenced to only 5 years. With good conduct and other benefits, Moller served just over a year for the death of Sean Kennedy (Algren). Lawmakers must clearly define and identify a hate crime and demand tougher penalties for these crimes, because past and current laws are deficient, unevenly applied, and too broad to be appropriately enforced and enforced. The FBI began investigating “hate crimes” early on. The first case against the Ku Klux Klan was opened in the 1920s. In 1990, the FBI passed the Hate Crime Statistics Act,...... middle of paper......2011. October 30, 2011.execution_1_lawrence-russell-brewer-john-william-king-shawn-berry?_s=PM:JUSTICE>.Shepard, Judy. “Matthew Shepard Foundation” Our story. Matthew Shepard Foundation -. Matthewshepard.org. Internet. December 6, 2011. "Rodney King defeated: MARCH 19, 1991." Prop1.org, March 19, 1991. November 2, 2011. Turley, Jonathan. "Prosecutors consider hate crime charges in Clementi case." Jonathanturley.org. October 3, 2010. October 26, 2011. .Wellman, Christopher Heath. “Hate crimes deserve harsher punishment.” At issue: what is a hate crime? Ed Robert Winters. Detroit, MI: Greenhaven Press., 2007. 24-36.