Listener, in a previous episode we covered a story which was instrumental in expanding

and formalizing anti-hate crime legislation at a federal level in the United States.

This change in the law just over 10 years ago was a long time coming for those who campaigned

hard for minority groups to be legally protected against racism, homophobia, and transphobia.

That piece of legislation is named after two people who were victims of vicious hate crimes.

One was 23-year-old Matthew Shepard, a gay college student who was murdered by two men

in Laramy, Wyoming because of his sexual orientation.

Like Matthew, James was a member of another minority which is significantly overrepresented

in hate crime statistics.

African Americans account for 28% of all hate crime victims, despite comprising of only

13% of the nation's population.

According to NBC News, FBI found that despite the past three years seeing a decline in racially

motivated crimes targeting African Americans, the number of reported hate crimes committed

against them continues to exceed other hate crimes committed against other minorities.

February 2020 marked a legislative watershed in the United States.

With the Emmett Till anti-lynching act passing the House representatives in a bipartisan

vote.

This newer legislation is named in memory of 14-year-old Emmett Till, an African-American

teen who was beaten and lynched in Monroe, Mississippi in 1955.

After allegedly whistling at a white woman in a grocery store, two men charged with Emmett's

murder were acquitted by an all-white jury, despite the men later confessing to the crime.

According to NBC News, the woman who originally accused Emmett emitted over 60 years later

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