Accomplishing Masculinity through Anti-Lesbian,Gay,Bisexual,and Transgender Homicide

Abstract

In the current study, we seek to understand the dynamic processes of fatal attacks against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) individuals across different situational circumstances. A review of prior research and story line analyses of 121 anti-LGBT homicides led to the creation of a homicide typology based on offender mode of victim selection. Guided by symbolic interactionism and theories of masculinity and violence, five representative case studies are conducted based on various open-source materials. The purpose of the case studies is to examine the applicability of theories of masculinity and violence for explaining anti-LGBT homicides across different modes of victim selection. We conclude that interactionist and masculinity theories of violence can in part illuminate how and why offenders use violence to demonstrate masculinity in some anti-LGBT homicide scenarios.

Keywords

criminology hegemonic masculinity violence sexuality deviance

Examining the criminal behaviors of violent offenders who target lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) victims is one way to illuminate the relationship between sexual practices and the accomplishment of gender. Demonstrations of heterosexuality, through both words and actions, are used by males to express their masculinity. Men routinely enter into social situations where expectations of “appropriate” heterosexual conduct are met and dichotomous social constructions of male and female are reified. In contrast, members of the LGBT community reject heterosexual scripts and fail to operate within the realm of situationally and socially acceptable gender roles. Such aberrations may be viewed as situated opportunities to “punish” LGBT individuals who reject traditional heteronormative lifestyles. Verbal and physical sanctions by heterosexual males demonstrate conformity to traditional definitions of masculinity. Situated opportunities for retribution have in some instances evolved into serious acts of violence, including homicide. To date, there is limited research in the United States that combines theoretical application of sociological and criminological theory with empirical analysis of fatal acts of violence against the LGBT community. Despite some important advances in our understanding of fatal acts of anti-LGBT violence (e.g., Tomsen 2009), significant gaps remain in what is known about the situational variations in which male offenders target individuals as victims of anti-LGBT homicide.

The current study draws from theories of masculine violence and conducts a qualitative analysis of event trajectories and the circumstances under which situated interactions escalate into fatal outcomes for members of the LGBT community. We define anti-LGBT homicide as acts of lethal violence committed by offenders who target victims based on their real or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity (e.g., transgendered identity). This study extends the literature of bias crime and gendered violence in two ways. First, we consider anti-LGBT homicide to be a heterogeneous phenomenon and question whether the behaviors of homicide initiation and escalation vary in patterned and distinct ways. Moreover, we suggest that the circumstances under which offenders select their victims (i.e., mode of victim selection) is an important distinguishing characteristic of anti-LGBT homicide. Second, we draw from the symbolic interactionist perspective to explain gendered violence and the situational expression of masculinity using original empirical data of five diverse homicide situations. To examine homicide situations, information gathered from all available open-sources on selected anti-LGBT homicide events are gathered and systematically analyzed. We then conduct a cross-comparative case study analysis of five different forms of homicide distinguished by mode of victim selection in order to examine the diverse nature in which masculinity is situationally expressed through sexualized violence against LGBT victims.

Symbolic Interactionism and Situated Violence

Symbolic interactionism suggests that it is necessary to examine how social actors define situations in face-to-face interactions in order to understand their future social actions (Blumer 1969). From this perspective, situational definitions are socially constructed and evolve throughout the course of action, as actors assess their environments and the behaviors of others. Goffman (1959) furthered symbolic interactionist theory by explaining social behavior from a dramaturgical perspective which suggests that social actors imagine themselves in one another’s “roles” to inform their own roles. He also trumpeted the importance of considering social contexts in which social interactions occur and recognized the symbiotic relationship between situated role-play and broader status hierarchies in society.

Several scholars have relied on symbolic interactionism to examine situations of violence, including homicide. Disillusioned with positivist approaches to studying violence, interactionist Lonnie Athens (1980) used participant observation and interviews of violent offenders to study the interpretive and situated nature of homicide. His work found that actors form violent interpretations of situations prior to committing violent acts, but these violent interpretations do not inevitably lead to the completion of violent acts, considering the role the social interaction plays in the completion of the violent event. In addition, Luckenbill (1977) relied on official police and court documents to reconstruct homicide cases in order to explain the dynamic interchanges that occur between offenders and victims during fatal events. Relying on Goffman’s (1959) notion of “character contests,” Luckenbill revealed how offenders and victims become positioned within dynamic situated transactions that involve exchanges of insults and attempts at “saving face.” His work also showed how certain resources become available over the course of a criminal event, including the presence of bystanders and weapons, which can influence how social actors perceive and define situations, as well as the escalation or de-escalation of violence.

Masculinity and Violence

Other scholars have drawn from an interactionist perspective to study masculinity, sexuality, and violence. Polk (1994), for example, relied on official homicide files to conduct case studies of homicide and captured the dynamic interactions between victims and offenders within particular social contexts. He believed that explanations of the victim–offender relationship had been oversimplified and that prior research was unable to adequately explain why homicide occurs. Polk’s findings demonstrated that homicide was a primarily masculine activity, whereby perpetrators, who were typically lower-class males, used homicide as a criminal resource to establish a dominant masculine identity in relation to women but also in relation to other men.

The most significant contribution to this area of research has been the work of James Messerschmidt (2012, 34) and his structured action theory, which “…emphasizes that it is through reflexive internal deliberations about the constraints and enabling aspects of social structures that people ultimately develop characteristic strategies for handling situations in which gender and sexual relations are present.” His framework helps explain why some situations are more conducive to the occurrence of sexualized violence. In particular, he suggests that sexualized violence can result from cognitive dissonances, or “challenges” to one’s gender or sexuality, based on incongruences between socially constructed scripts and actual gendered and sexual practices. Upon such challenges, gender and sexuality become more salient to the situation at hand and males may perceive sanctioning acts of violence as available resources for reaffirming their masculinity (Messerschmidt 1993, 2012). It follows that violence against those participating in deviant sexual practices would be considered the optimal resource to reestablish dominance.

Violent Bias Crime

Other scholars focus specifically on violence that discriminately targets social minority groups, including sexual orientation and gender identity minorities. Barbary Perry (2001), for instance, recognized that bias crime provides a way for men, particularly lower-class men, to accomplish masculinity. Drawing from the theories of doing gender and difference (West and Fenstermaker 1995; West and Zimmerman 1987), as well as Messerschmidt’s (1993, 2012) structured action theory, Perry theorized that bias crime offenders draw from social structures, such as cultural and institutional discourses, to formulate ways of doing difference (e.g., race, class, gender, and sexuality) appropriately. Bias crime is one method of policing behavior and of holding others accountable to heterosexist social scripts. In this way, individuals are encouraged to vilify homosexuality and risk being sanctioned if they choose not to do so (see West and Zimmerman 1987). Although she discusses many forms of bias violence, Perry suggests that gay men provide a particularly good resource for establishing masculine dominance.

Bufkin (1999) also drew from doing gender and structured action theories, as well as Connell’s (1987) conceptualization of hegemonic masculinity, or a form of dominant masculinity that when enacted further subordinates all other masculinities and femininities, to the study of bias crime.¹ She argued that an effort to accomplish or “do” hegemonic masculinity remains at the heart of bias offending. This stems in part from the fact that the victims of bias crimes are antithetical to the “hegemonic ideal” of manhood which emphasizes aggressiveness, competitiveness, risk-taking, and other similar qualities (Bufkin 1999, 157). She contended that hegemonic forms of masculinity have both racial and sexual undertones derived from cultural and institutional ideology and that perpetrating bias crime is one way to maintain existing “heterosexist” social structures (see Herek 1990).

The most extensive empirical research on anti-LGBT homicide events is the work of Stephen Tomsen (2002, 2006, 2009). Recognizing the merits of symbolic interactionist studies of sexuality, Tomsen (2009) has examined antihomosexual homicides in New South Wales through an analysis of situational and participant characteristics of anti-LGBT homicide informed by Connell’s concept of hegemonic masculinity and other masculinity theories. Recognizing the heterogeneous nature of anti-LGBT fatal attacks, his findings revealed two general scenarios of lethal antihomosexual violence. The first scenario consisted of attacks between people, usually men, that occurred in a public space and were often “marked by a tone of outrage” (Tomsen 2009, 66), whereas the second violent scenario was more confrontational in nature and typically occurred in private. Importantly, Tomsen found that each of these violent situations involved the offender’s attempt to reproduce his own masculine identity, in addition to policing the perceived subordinate masculine identities of other men.

Typifying anti-LGBT homicide

We suggest that it is important to disaggregate by crime type and bias type in order to capture the unique qualities of homicides specifically targeting LGBT homicide victims. In contrast, most prior research on bias crime has largely neglected to disaggregate bias violence by crime or bias type. Assuming homogeneity across crime type (e.g., homicide, robbery, and assault), however, may lead researchers to miss important distinctions across types of lethal and nonlethal violence. In addition, assuming homogeneity across bias type (e.g., antisexual orientation, gender identity, race, and religion) fails to recognize potentially unique patterns of violence occurring across different offender biases and victim selection processes.

Based on prior research and an analysis of homicide story lines, we identify and explore the patterned nature of five distinct types of anti-LGBT homicide that are defined by how offenders select LGBT victims. In previous research, we have proposed a five-part typology of anti-LGBT homicide based on offenders’ mode of victim selection (Gruenewald and Kelley 2014). As discussed subsequently, we first began with umbrella categories of anti-LGBT homicide that were identified in prior research to distinguish two general scenarios of how these acts of violence are initiated (Fisher and Salfati 2009; Tomsen 2009). Second, we carefully read each of the open-source files of anti-LGBT homicide maintained by the Extremist Crime Database (ECDB; discussed in the Method section) and identified the circumstances under which offenders selected and encountered their victims. This involved conducting a “story line analysis” for each anti-LGBT homicide, fully describing the circumstances in which offenders initially came into contact with offenders, how the situation escalated into lethal violence, and how offenders behaved following the attacks (Agnew 2006). For the current study, one case from each typology subcategory was chosen for in-depth analysis. Identifying cases for in-depth analysis based on a typological categorization scheme provides one useful technique for purposively selecting cases (see Bennett and Elman 2006) and allows for a diverse sample of anti-LGBT homicides to be considered for qualitative analysis.

The typology consisted of two umbrella categories of anti-LGBT homicide based on offender mode of victim selection (predatory and responsive) that were further disaggregated into five distinct subcategories of anti-LGBT homicide (predatory-representative, predatory-instrumental, responsive-gay bash, responsive-undesired advance, and responsive-mistaken identity). The two umbrella categories were derived based on prior research (Fisher and Salfati 2009; Tomsen 2009) and capture the extent of planning by offenders as well as the presence of victim provocation. Predatory homicides are planned and occur without victim provocation and responsive homicides are unplanned, confrontational crimes in which victims unconsciously or consciously provoke offenders. Examples of victim provocation include reciprocal acts on the part of victims, such as returning verbal insults, complimenting the offenders on their physical appearance and other perceived advances, or more passive acts, such as verbally or physically making their homosexual orientation known in public. The umbrella categories were an effective way to disaggregate anti-LGBT homicides, considering that they show how anti-LGBT homicides are not necessarily predatory events; however, relevant literature and a systematic review of case materials also revealed that fatal events could be meaningfully disaggregated further.

Predatory anti-LGBT homicides were disaggregated into representative and instrumental crimes. First, representative homicides are symbolic crimes in which offenders choose victims as representatives of the LGBT community in order to send a message about the dangers associated with identifying as nonheterosexual. Whether representative offenders seek out specific LGBT individuals or whether they utilize places LGBT individuals congregate, victims play no role in the provocation. The second subcategory of predatory homicide is instrumental homicide, in which offenders select LGBT victims to rob based on their sexual orientation or gender identity. Instrumental homicides are what Berk, Boyd, and Hamner (2002) described as “actuarial crimes” involving offenders who “make lay estimates of central tendencies associated with particular social categories” in order to select victims (p. 128). Offenders are not robbing gay men because of “what [their] sexual orientation represents to [the offenders] but because they apply a stereotype” (p. 128) that homosexuals are not as capable of fighting back or are less willing to report the robbery in order to conceal their sexual orientation and related behaviors. These crimes are considered instrumental because victims are chosen as a means to another end (i.e., robbery; see Block and Block 1992). Although theft occurs to some extent within each homicide subcategory, instrumental homicides are distinct, as offenders are primarily oriented toward profit and theft is the defining characteristic of each homicide. Importantly, Berk, Boyd, and Hamner (2002) suggested that actuarial (instrumental, here) crimes are not motivated by “hate” and should not be labeled as such. Indeed, it is debatable whether offenders who target victims based on their actuarial status are perpetrating bias homicides. In the current study, however, instrumental anti-LGBT homicides are examined as bias crimes because the victims were selected based on an integral component of their identity—their sexual orientation. This approach is supported by other research on bias crimes which has suggested that “bigotry may serve as a factor in the selection of the particular victim rather than as the catalyst to the criminal act” (Messner, McHugh, and Felson 2004, 608).

Within the umbrella category of anti-LGBT responsive homicide, there are three anti-LGBT homicide subcategories. In each subcategory, offenders are responding to some action by victims, which is how victims come to play a role in the provocation of the offenders and the escalation of violence. First, undesired advance homicide offenders select victims in response to a real or perceived sexual or romantic advance made by the victim. Victims either erroneously conclude that offenders are interested in a physical or romantic relationship or in some cases offenders suddenly change their mind after initially conveying interest in participating in such a relationship. The second subcategory of responsive homicide is mistaken identity homicide, which is characterized by offenders who engage in or plan to engage in a sexual encounter with the victim. Offenders kill victims after they find that the victims’ sex is not what the offenders had perceived it to be. In other words, victims are killed after offenders discover the victims’ sex does not align with their gender display or perceived sex category. In the majority of situations, the homicide occurs between male offenders and transwomen. The realization of the victims’ sex occurs prior, during, or after a sexual encounter between the offender and victim. In such cases, offenders may feel deceived, leading them to respond to the situation by killing the victim. Although mistaken identity cases may be framed similarly to undesired advance cases in the media, these homicides are distinct because a consensual sexual encounter is anticipated by both victim and offender prior to the homicide. The offender targets the victim for violence due to gender confusion, rather than an unwanted sexual advance by the victim, as in cases of undesired advance homicides. The third subcategory of responsive homicide is known as gay bash homicide and it is the most common responsive homicide type. Whereas undesired advance and mistaken identity homicides are characterized by offenders responding to specific wrongdoings by the victims, gay bash offenders are responding to any perceived wrongdoing by the victim (excluding the homicides captured by undesired advance and mistaken identity subcategories). Gay bash homicides are those in which offenders choose victims based on a perceived insult or show of disrespect by the victim. While victims contribute to the escalation of violence, victims did not necessarily initiate the violence and were unlikely to be conscious of their wrongdoing.

Method

The current study utilizes open-source materials for in-depth study of specific anti-LGBT violence cases. This is different from others who have relied heavily on police data which are affected by discrepancies in agency-specific reporting procedures (Nolan and Akiyama 1999; Perry 2001) and agency policies (Boyd, Berk, and Hamner 1996; Cronin et al. 2007; Haider-Markel 2002; McDevitt et al. 2000; Nolan and Akiyama 1999; Walker and Katz 1995). Moreover, very little event-level and contextual information about bias crime is available in official national bias crime data.

Incidents of anti-LGBT homicide were selected for case study analysis from an open-source database known as the ECDB, which includes event-level data on extremist crimes occurring in the United States (Freilich et al. 2014). The ECDB project is co-led by Drs. Steven Chermak and Joshua D. Freilich and has been funded by the Department of Homeland Security separately and in conjunction with the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism since 2006.² While the ECDB primarily focuses on crimes committed by domestic extremists in the United States, it also offers limited data on bias homicides not committed by offenders associated with domestic extremist movements.³ This is important as bias offenders usually have no affiliations to organized hate groups. The ECDB identifies bias homicides from open-sources, including advocacy group reports, academic chronologies, and media searches. The process of systematically identifying extremist homicides from open-sources has been detailed elsewhere (Freilich et al. 2014; Gruenewald 2012).

For an anti-LGBT homicide to be included in the ECDB, the lethal act must have included one or more bias indicators (see also Gruenewald 2012). Anti-LGBT homicide bias indicators include (1) gender-based derogatory remarks and verbal harassment made by the offender toward the victim, (2) symbolic (sexualized) manipulation of the victim’s body, (3) symbolic location of the body, (4) selection of a victim through an LGBT organization, (5) an official bias crime charge, (6) offender admission, and (7) prior anti-LGBT violence perpetrated by the offender against the victim or someone else. These indicators specify how offenders selected victims based on their perceived sexual orientation or gender identity. While in many instances it may be the case that bias indicators are merely an indirect way to capture offenders’ motives, these indicators represent observable crime scene characteristics and do not require psychiatric probing. Thus, the study circumvents the problems of prior research studies, which have attempted to penetrate offenders’ minds to determine what they were thinking prior to committing violence. This approach also allows us to capture anti-LGBT homicides that are considered dual-purpose homicides, such as those involving robbery and homicides in which victims play a role in the provocation. Offenders may have multiple selection criteria when targeting LGBT victims as offender selection of victims is a process. In short, we suggest bias indicators based on offender selection, rather than motive, may be a more reliable way to capture the various situational circumstances of anti-LGBT homicide. Once cases are selected for inclusion, each anti-LGBT homicide is open-source searched in over 20 web-based search engines by ECDB researchers and all relevant information is collected and organized by case (Freilich et al. 2014).

Case Selection

The application of bias indicators to potential anti-LGBT homicides resulted in 121 cases occurring in the United States between 1990 and 2010.⁴ Five cases were selected from the ECDB for in-depth case study analysis that represented one of the situational categories defined by offender mode of victim selection. Borrowing loosely from Hamm’s (2007) two-stage approach to case selection, ⁵ the selection of cases was based on an initial quantitative comparative analysis of anti-LGBT homicide subgroups (Gruenewald and Kelley 2014). Statistical findings in prior research indicated significant similarities and differences in offender-, victim-, and incident-level characteristics across four of the homicide subtypes. Cases were selected because they involved several crime characteristics found to statistically distinguish a particular homicide subtype from other anti-LGBT homicide categories (Gruenewald and Kelley 2014).⁶ Basing case selection primarily on statistical differences across homicide subtypes allowed us to capture the most representative cases. Though the explanatory capacity and quantity of open-source materials were also considered during case selection, none of the cases selected were chosen randomly or arbitrarily, and selected homicides did not represent the most high profile of possible cases. Once homicides were selected for case studies, supplementary items (e.g., books, documentaries, and additional court documents) were also collected for the five cases in order to contextualize the findings from open-source data. For example, in case study 1 (the murder of Sakia Gunn), we collected the most recent open-source materials available at the time of the search, which included news articles, prosecutors’ news releases, blog posts, and YouTube videos. Additional research for supplementary items yielded a documentary, dissertation, scholarly and academic articles, and academic and journalistic novels. For some other cases, supplementary items such as these were not available; instead, over 100 pages of open-source documents were collected including court documents detailing the homicide events from the LexisNexis database of legal documents. Having multiple accounts of the homicide cases allowed us to build a confident story line without having to speak to the offenders. In cases for which conflicting accounts of victim selection motives were provided, traditionally “trusted” sources of open-source information were relied upon (i.e., court documents and police records).

Narrative Construction

In this study, we use an in-depth case study approach to determine how and why anti-LGBT homicides occurred across different modes of victim selection by providing rich descriptions of the dynamic processes involved in anti-LGBT homicide events. The first step of case study analysis utilizes the criminal event perspective (CEP; Sacco and Kennedy 2002) to develop a comprehensive narrative. Sacco and Kennedy (2002) developed this framework for studying criminal events that consists of three parts: (1) the precursor or the contextual and situational level factors that bring people together in a certain time and space, (2) the transaction or the dynamic social interactions between offenders, victims, and other crime participants that contribute to the evolution of the criminal event, and (3) the aftermath or the actions that occur after the completion of a crime, such as offender flee or capture. The CEP allows anti-LGBT homicides to be conceptualized as multidimensional events that unfold over these successive interactive stages. Rather than privileging the victim, the offender, or the place in which a crime occurs, this perspective places offenders, victims, and other criminal participants (i.e., bystanders) into a situational context, resulting in a more comprehensive crime analysis.

The second step of case study analysis involves the systematic application of previous theoretical explanations of bias crime to anti-LGBT homicide situations. This entails an evaluation of the explanatory potential of theories and concepts such as “doing gender” (West and Zimmerman 1987), “hegemonic masculinity” (Connell 2005), “heterosexism” (Herek 1990), and “gender challenges” (Messerschmidt 1993, 2012). Theorists such as Bufkin (1999) and Perry (2001) have applied these theories to bias crimes generally, but neither was able to systematically apply them to empirical data of anti-LGBT bias crimes. To date, the only research known to apply gender and sexuality theories to empirical data is that of Tomsen and Mason (2001) and Tomsen (2002, 2006, 2009); however, Tomsen was not able to examine the relevance of masculinity theories across the heterogeneous circumstances of the various anti-LGBT homicide situations of the typology utilized for the current research. It is essential to explore the explanatory power of masculinity theories across diverse situational circumstances, which could lend credence to the previous theoretical literature. Just as important, if masculinity theories are not applicable across variable modes of victim selection, this study may show that such theories currently have limited utility for explaining anti-LGBT occurrences.

Comparative Case Study Findings

In this section, we begin our discussion of case study findings across the five anti-LGBT homicides examined for this study (see Tables 1 –5). A historic way for males to achieve hegemonic masculinity is by supporting their families and engaging in a professional career. Because some, typically younger, males do not have access to as many opportunities to achieve a dominant masculine identity through family or work, they maintain subordinate social statuses. Research has also identified that it is young men who are more likely to perpetrate anti-LGBT homicides against gay men who have made sexual advances toward the offenders (Bartlett 2007). Prior research has suggested that most violent offenders and bias offenders are young males who have had conventional avenues to achieving masculinity blocked (Bufkin 1999; Messerschmidt 2000, 2012; Perry 2001; Polk 1994; Tomsen 2009). In lieu of legitimate opportunities, bias offending by young males serves as an alternative way to construct a hegemonic masculine identity. The case studies support prior research finding that it is often young men who use violence to do gender to counteract the age subordination they experience. While the offenders in the gay bash (see Table 1) and representative cases (see Table 4) were approximately thirty years old, the other offenders were all in their late teens or early twenties. Researchers have also found that criminal offenders are overwhelmingly lower or working class and poor (Messerschmidt 2012; Polk 1994; Tomsen 2009). As shown in the tables, the anti-LGBT cases examined show that offenders’ histories are consistent with this finding. The offenders in our study did not have professional jobs and those with jobs held working class and service positions. Only one offender was known to be attending college (see Table 3), despite finding that a majority of the offenders represented ages of typical college students. By examining the precursor attributes across the case studies, it becomes clear that only the offenders involved in the instrumental anti-LGBT homicide had known violent criminal histories. This suggests that instrumental offenders represent a unique type of bias offender and one that may share more commonalities with traditional violent offenders than typical perpetrators of bias crime attacks.

Table 1.

The Gay Bash Murder of Sakia Gunn.

Precursor Attributes	Transaction Attributes	Aftermath Attributes
The victim, Sakia Gunn, was a fifteen-year-old girl living in Newark, New Jersey, at the time of her death. Gunn, an “aggressive” lesbian, wore oversized male clothing (e.g., baggy blue jeans, extra-large white T-shirts, and “do-rags”) the night she was killed. The offender, Richard McCullough, was a twenty-nine-year-old male who had two children, though his relationship with his children and their mothers is unclear. McCullough had only a minor, nonviolent criminal record and held working-class jobs for most of his adult life (Zook 2006, 31). McCullough arguably held a low social status and had few legitimate resources or opportunities for achieving masculinity.	After spending the evening in the New York City “Gay Mecca,” Gunn and her friends returned to Newark. In the early morning hours, while standing at a bus station, they were approached by Richard McCullough and his acquaintance. Both had allegedly been drinking and cruising the streets of Newark. The suspects began to lewdly proposition Gunn and her friends as they waited for a bus. McCullough called out to Gunn, “Yo, shorty, come here … we wanna talk to you” (Zook 2006, 37), and asked “You the ringleader?” This type of speech reflects elements of dominance and demonstrates McCullough’s desire to take control of the situation. The girls rebuffed the advances and insulted McCullough by saying “We’re gay,” and “[w]e’re not interested” (Zook 2006, 31), thus presenting him with a gender “challenge.” According to the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office News Release on March 3, 2005, “upon having their ‘advances’ rebuffed by the young women, on the basis that they were of gay sexual orientation, both men directed antigay epithets at the young women.” After an initial physical struggle, McCullough again called out for Gunn to come to him and she replied, “No, I don’t gotta come … you ain’t my father” (Zook 2006, 38), serving another blow to McCullough’s manhood that fueled his desire to regain his masculine identity. The violent transaction continued until McCullough stabbed Gunn in the chest with a switchblade knife.	After the attacks, McCullough fled the scene with his acquaintance. Gunn’s friends flagged down a driver and Gunn bled to death on the way to the hospital. After surrendering himself days later, McCullough did admit to the anti-LGBT element of his crime when he confessed he called Sakia Gunn a “dyke” and pled guilty to bias intimidation in regard to aggravated manslaughter and aggravated assault.

Table 2.

The Undesired Advance Murder of Marcell Eads.

Precursor Attributes	Transaction Attributes	Aftermath Attributes
The victim, Marcell Eads, was a fifty-eight-year-old gay hairdresser from Wichita, Kansas. On June 29, 2001, he was fatally attacked by two teenage males, Brandon Boone, age sixteen, and Zachary Steward, age eighteen, both also from Wichita. Steward, who had a history of drug abuse and mental illness, lived with his father in poverty, while his mother had always been absent. Steward and the victim were acquaintances prior to the homicide, which is common to undesired advance homicides (Gruenewald and Kelley 2014). Unfortunately, little is known of Boone’s background based on open-sources, though prosecutors claim he had a history of antisocial behavior. On the evening of June 28, 2001, Steward and Eads attended a barbecue at the home of a mutual friend. On two occasions that evening, Steward and Eads made trips to Eads’ residence. After the first visit, Eads reported to their mutual friend that he and Steward had smoked crack cocaine and that Eads had performed oral sex on Steward. After their second visit to Eads’ home, Steward reported to his friend Brandon Boone and others that Eads had tried to sell him cocaine, grabbed Steward’s crotch, and offered him drugs to perform oral sex on him. Steward claimed he took beer and cigarettes from Eads’ home and then left. Steward “repeatedly said that he ‘wanted to kick the fag’s ass and take his shit’ in front of [Boone]” ( Kansas v. Boone 2004). Steward also invited another male to join himself and Boone in an assault on Eads, but Steward’s invitation was declined.	Boone and Steward arrived at Eads’ residence with the intention to assault and steal from Eads ( Boone v. Kansas 2007). Together the offenders made pinpricks to Eads’ arm, beat Eads with a candlestick holder, a broomstick or the end of a table or both, and stabbed him in the head with a knife. Steward and Boone also stole computer and stereo equipment from Eads ( Boone v. Kansas 2007). After initially leaving the victim’s home, the offenders decided that it was necessary to return “back to the fag’s house to wipe up the fingerprints they had left” ( Kansas v. Boone 2004). Upon their return, they struck Eads with a rock, and started a fire, demonstrating obvious overkill, or violence going above and beyond that required to kill a human being.	When Eads was discovered dead by firefighters, half of his body was burned, he was covered in soot and blood, and the blunt force injuries to his head and arms were severe enough to bruise his brain and expose bone. After being identified and arrested. Steward and Boone admitted to an anti-LGBT motive and blamed Eads’ unwanted sexual advance for the crime. Steward and Boone were not charged with hate-crime enhancements, which would have lengthened their sentences under Kansas law, despite this claim: “Other than the victim’s attempt to sell cocaine to Steward in exchange for a blow job, there is no evidence to suggest any provocation for the killing. The evidence establishes … and supports the inference that the victim’s sexual orientation provoked Steward and the defendant” ( Kansas v. Boone 2004).

Table 3.

The Mistaken Identity Murder of Gwen Araujo.

Precursor Attributes	Transaction Attributes	Aftermath Attributes
The victim, Gwen Araujo, was born male but had embraced a female gender identity by age fourteen. Because she had not undergone a sex reassignment surgery, she was more likely to be perceived as a gender deviant and to become a target of violence (Schilt and Westbrook 2009). The four male offenders responsible for killing Araujo, Jose Merel, Michael Magidson, Jaron Nabors, and Jason Cazares, were close friends. All were young males, between ages nineteen and twenty-two. Although three of the men had children, none of them were married. Only one of the offenders had a prior adult criminal record, which was related to an incident of public intoxication. Araujo visited Merel’s house and would flirt with the men. Two weeks prior to the homicide, it came forth that at least three of the offenders had engaged in oral and anal sex with Araujo. On the evening of October 3, 2002, after a night out, the offenders decided that they would question Araujo about her gender. At home, the offenders continued to drink and play games until Merel replied in a demanding tone, “We want to know why everybody—you want everybody to fuck you in the ass … Are you a woman or sloppy ass nigga?” Forcibly grabbing Araujo’s crotch area, the offenders discovered that the victim was wearing multiple pairs of underwear. Upon learning that the victim was anatomically male, Merel cried “I can’t be fuckin’ gay” and began to vomit and cry uncontrollably ( The People v. Merel and Magidson, 2009).	The victim was forced to the floor and her underwear was removed, revealing testicles, demonstrating the extreme attempts at policing Araujo’s sex and gender identity. Cazares and a bystander in the house attempted to free the victim, but their efforts were blocked by Nabors and Magidson. At some point, Araujo claimed that she had family members in a gang that would “shoot up the house” and kill the offenders if they did not free her. This likely further incited the offenders’ anger and served as an affront to their manhood, as the threat insinuated that they would ultimately lose their lives for “standing up” to Araujo. Meanwhile, Cazares asked Nabors if he was “down,” meaning to ask if he “had the back” of the others. Nabors agreed to participate in the assault on Araujo ( The People v. Merel and Magidson, 2009), exemplifying how males in groups can provoke violence in one another. Nabors and Cazares left to retrieve three shovels and a pickaxe so they could “kill the bitch” ( The People v. Merel and Magidson, 2009). The offenders do not use Araujo’s name throughout the transaction, but instead referred to her by the derogatory term “bitch,” which can be used to degrade females and to emasculate males. The offenders bound Araujo’s wrists and ankles with rope and wrapped her unresponsive body in a blanket. They carried Araujo to the garage where Magidson strangled her. The weapons used in this crime were all nonfirearms, which is consistent with anti-LGBT homicides in general (Gruenewald, 2012). The continuous and varied physical assaults represent overkill.	When the four offenders buried Araujo’s body in the Sierra Nevada Foothills, Merel said he was “still so mad that he could still kick her a couple times’” ( The People v. Merel and Magidson, 2009). The offenders were subsequently arrested and charged with murder with hate crime enhancements when Nabors was identified after revealing the murder to friends. The offenders admitted to an anti-LGBT motive when the defense used a “gay panic” or “trans panic” strategy in two trials, suggesting that the crime was one of passion in which the defendants were pushed into a rage due to the victim’s sexual deception.

Table 4.

The Representative Murder of Gary Matson and Winfield Mowder.

Precursor Attributes	Precursor Attributes	Aftermath Attributes
The victims, Gary Matson, age fifty, and his partner of sixteen years, Winfield Mowder, forty, were respected in their community. The two offenders were Benjamin Matthew Williams (BMW), thirty-one, and James Tyler Williams (JTW), twenty-nine. The brothers were low-skill workers employed by one of the businesses founded by the victims. Religion was an integral component of the lives of the private Christian Fundamentalist family and their father was a domestic extremist. The two had been home-schooled by their mother until high school and spent little time socializing outside of their church. As an adult, BMW experienced multiple transitions, which included college and a short stint in the Navy. During this time, BMW dated a woman who became pregnant with his child. BMW became upset because having a child out of wedlock went against his religious beliefs. The unwillingness of his ex-girlfriend to marry likely served as an affront to his masculinity, as he was prevented from fulfilling the hegemonic male role of a husband, father, and leader of a family. BMW belonged to a church which took a strong stance against homosexuality, demonstrating how some religious institutions play a key role in the production and maintenance of heterosexism in society (see Herek 1990). Disillusioned with organized religion, BMW eventually left the church and began identifying with the White separatists and White supremacists, as well as other quasi-religious groups characterized by their dislike for the government and their belief that Jews, homosexuals, and non-Whites were inferior beings. JTW was an honor roll student in high school, with few friends. Always looking for a place to fit in, JTW was working to earn BMW’s acceptance, while BMW sought the social acceptance from the extremist groups. Neither brother had a prior criminal record; however, two weeks before the homicide the brothers set three Sacramento-area synagogues afire as symbolic of their anti-Semitic religious beliefs.	It appears that Matson and Mowder were forced onto their bed and one or both of the offenders stood on a chair to shoot the men (Stanton and Delsohn 1999). According to JTW, BMW entered the home first and JTW heard gunshots as he entered. JTW believed the victims had been asleep when they were shot. Obvious differences are observed between this representative homicide and the confrontational responsive homicides previously examined. In particular, the Williams brothers planned this attack and did not have any confrontation with Matson or Mowder during or prior to the homicide. Though Matson and Mowder had many bullet wounds, it is not evident that the offenders’ actions constituted excessive violence. Typical of representative offenses (Gruenewald and Kelley 2014), there is no evidence of antihomosexual language used by the offenders during the homicide transaction. The Williams brothers stole Matson’s credit card, his wallet, his driver’s license, his Social Security card, and his car. In this case, it is apparent that the Williams brothers targeted Matson and Mowder for their sexual orientation and that the theft held only an “incidental relation” to the crime (Tomsen 2009, 67).	Matson’s brother found the victims dead soon after their death. Both offenders were arrested on July 7, as they tried to pick up a package of ammunition reloading equipment and gun belts they had ordered with one of the victim’s credit cards. Continuing their spree of ideologically motivated violence, the offenders firebombed an abortion clinic the day following the murders. The homicides were investigated as hate crimes. BMW gave several media interviews, where he shared his White supremacist beliefs and admitted to killing Matson and Mowder because of their sexual orientation. BMW claimed he was obeying biblical laws stating that “I’m not guilty of murder … I’m guilty of obeying the laws of the Creator” (Stanton and Delsohn 2003). He also described himself as a Christian martyr who hoped to incite further violence against Jews, non-Whites, and homosexuals. Still in jail, BMW and another inmate attacked a deputy with a homemade hatchet in an escape attempt. BMW was found guilty of attempted murder and faced a life sentence. He was moved to an isolation cell, where he committed suicide on November 17, 2001 with a disposable razor he had modified to cut his femoral arteries, his arms, and his neck.

Table 5.

The Instrumental Murder of Brian Betts.

Precursor Attributes	Transaction Attributes	Aftermath Attributes
The victim, Brian Betts, was a forty-two-year-old well-known school principal. The four offenders, Alante Saunders, Sharif Lancaster, Deontra Gray, and Joel Johnson, were all teenaged males. Scholars have found that men perpetrating bias offenses in groups produce collective masculinity (Bufkin 1999; Tomsen 2009); however, the evidence in the current case does not support this finding. More likely, the offenders in this case sought to ensure the success of the robbery by offending as a group. The offenders all seemed to have volatile pasts. For example, Saunders had no fixed address and was staying with a friend at the time of the homicide. In addition, Lancaster is described as having a “troubled childhood” (Morse 2010) and his mother was previously found to be an unsuitable guardian. The offenders resided in the D.C. area and, despite their youth, each one had an extensive criminal history. Collectively, the offenders had been charged with offenses ranging from minor property crime to serious violence. Prosecutors claimed Lancaster and Saunders were both members of gangs and these two, along with Gray, were wanted by law enforcement. The extensive criminal histories of the offenders distinguish them from the offenders in the previous four case studies. On the evening of April 14, 2010, Saunders relied on a national sex-chat line to select Betts, a homosexual stranger, as a robbery victim (O’Bryan 2010). Saunders and Betts agreed that he would leave his door unlocked so that Saunders could meet Betts inside his house. Under the guise of a romantic or sexual encounter, Saunders was able to easily enter his victim’s home and make certain that Betts would be found in a vulnerable situation.	The four offenders arrived at Betts’ house sometime late in the night. Saunders entered first and approached the victim in his room. Lancaster went inside second and saw Saunders, armed with a gun, robbing the victim. During the robbery, Saunders shot Betts from a distance at least one time, causing injuries to his heart, lungs, and spine. At some point, the other offenders also entered Betts’ home and assisted in the robbery. Characteristic of instrumental homicides, there was no evidence that offenders used antihomosexual epithets throughout the course of the crime or that offenders’ actions constituted overkill. While research has shown nonfirearms are more prevalent for anti-LGBT homicides (Gruenewald, 2012), when instrumental homicides are examined separately the prevalence of guns increases.	The day following the homicide, a coworker found Betts dead in his home. Later, The offender, Lancaster, his mom, and Saunders were caught using Betts’ credit cards, which led to their identification. Investigators and prosecutors claimed there was no evidence to support a hate crime charge. Instead, the homicide motive was officially identified as robbery. It is frequently the case in mixed-motive homicides that investigators and prosecutors choose to not focus on bias elements of criminal events. The offenders did not admit to an anti-LGBT motive. Saunders claimed the gun went off accidentally and said, “I didn’t go there meaning to harm him in any way. And it was just over basically getting money for drugs. Drugs was the powerful force in this situation …” (Morse 2010, 13).

Males may also seek dominance through establishing themselves as the head of a household, getting married, and having children. Of the thirteen total offenders in the five cases, none of the men were known to be married, but at least five had children, with little evidence that offenders had established relationships with their children. While little is known regarding offenders’ upbringings, it is evident that some offenders experienced childhood and adolescence with little support from one or both parents. The Williams brothers (see Table 4) are unique, as they grew up in a two-parent family. A close examination of the role the Williams’ parents played, however, reveals how the brothers’ parents actually contributed to their social marginalization. In short, it appears that at the time of the anti-LGBT attacks, all of the offenders represented in these case studies had not achieved a conventional family life and employment opportunities. Perceiving obstacles to such means of masculinity, it is plausible that they pursued anti-LGBT violence as another, more accessible, avenue for achieving a dominant masculine identity.

Anti-LGBT Homicide Situations and Masculinized Contexts

The case studies also revealed how contexts in which homicide occurs were masculinized in several ways. First, three of the five case studies showed evidence that offenders had engaged in drug use, alcohol use, or both just prior to the homicide. This allowed for an exploration of how alcohol and drugs may play a role in the offenders’ perpetration of an anti-LGBT homicide. According to Tomsen (2009, 94), social psychologists have found that “heavy group drinking” is linked to “the importance of issues of male honor in the social interaction that leads to violent behavior.” Moreover, Bufkin (1999, 166) has suggested that offenders have been shown to be “easily prompted to engage in violent acts” because “both behaviors, the drinking and the violence, result from the same stimulus—the need to assert masculinity.” Research on intimate partner violence has also revealed that males use alcohol to demonstrate masculinity when they perceive that they occupy an inferior gender status and that drinking may also have disinhibiting effects on males (Peralta, Tuttle, and Steele 2010). Findings from the undesired advance (see Table 2) and mistaken identity cases (see Table 3) support this research; however, the role of alcohol is not as well established in the gay bash homicide despite some evidence that the offender was drinking prior to the homicide (see Table 1). In contrast, there does not appear to be a masculinized context of drinking or drug use in the precursor stage of instrumental or representative anti-LGBT homicides.

A second contextual variant of anti-LGBT homicide is the presence of multiple offenders and bystanders. One of the central tenets of doing gender theory is that individuals are always aware that they are being assessed and are accountable to their perceived gender (West and Zimmerman 1987). Consequently, offenders are conscious that they might be punished by co-offenders, bystanders, or others if they fail to perform gender appropriately in a particular situation. While prior research has found that multiple offender homicides constitute a substantial minority of anti-LGBT homicides (Gruenewald and Kelley 2014), the current research tells us something about the dynamics of multiple offender attacks. Evidence from the mistaken identity, undesired advance, and representative cases reveals that offenders encouraged each other to perpetrate lethal acts of anti-LGBT violence. Some examples of this include, in the undesired advance case, Steward inviting Boone and another male (who declined) to join him in “kicking the fag’s ass” ( Kansas v. Boone 2004); in the mistaken identity case, Cazares ensuring that Nabors “had the back” of the other offenders ( The People v. Merel and Magidson 2009); and, in the representative case, Benjamin Matthew Williams (BMW) explaining to his younger brother that if they believed homosexuality was a sin they were obligated to kill the victims. Scholars have found that males who perpetrate bias offenses together are constructing a collective masculinity—that group attacks provide males with “instant positive feedback,” so that others may be motivated to act similarly (Bufkin 1999, 163). It is possible that these offenders were influenced by norms of male honor and fearlessness. The exception to this is the instrumental case. Though this case involved four offenders, there were no indicators that they incited violence with challenges to one another’s gender or sexuality. Rather, it appears the instrumental offenders were merely seeking to ensure a successful robbery by perpetrating the attack collectively.

In addition to being influenced by co-offenders, the presence of bystanders may have inadvertently contributed to the escalation of violence in the homicides (see also Luckenbill 1977). For example, in the gay bash case that was examined (see Table 1), McCullough’s male acquaintance and Sakia’s four friends were present throughout the homicide, meaning McCullough’s gender performance occurred in front of another male to whom he was accountably masculine. In the undesired advance homicide (Table 2), bystanders were not present for the crime, but the offenders did interact with friends intermittently throughout the homicide transaction. Bystander presence likely contributed to the offenders’ actions in the mistaken identity case, as two males (brothers of the offender Merel) and a female (a girlfriend of one of Merel’s brothers) were present in addition to the four male offenders (see Table 3). Due to the gender challenges offenders experienced, the offenders in these cases were performing roles in situations in which gender and sexuality were salient. That their actions occurred in front of the bystanders may have heavily influenced their desire to do gender “properly” and to seek a dominant masculine identity or else they might have risked being sanctioned.

Third, case studies allowed for the examination of the unique roles that theft played under different circumstances of anti-LGBT homicide situations. Research on anti-LGBT homicide has demonstrated that robbery can be the primary motive of an antihomosexual offense or that property may be stolen as “an afterthought or a further means of victim degradation” (Tomsen 2009, 67). In the instrumental homicide case (Table 5), robbery was the primary reason the offenders targeted a LGBT individual. In contrast, theft occurred in the undesired advance and representative homicide cases, but it was apparent that monetary gain played a secondary role to the homicide. In the undesired advance case (Table 2), examining Steward’s early statement that he “wanted to kick the fag’s ass and take his shit” ( Kansas v. Boone 2004) in context suggests that Steward’s theft was his attempt to further insult his victim and to restore his lost honor. Thus, the theft could be understood as a means for Steward to further reestablish his subordinated masculinity following Eads’ sexual advance. In the representative case (Table 4), the homicide was clearly meant to be symbolic. The theft of Matson’s credit cards did not factor into the Williams brothers’ decision to kill the gay couple and only appeared to be an incentive of homicide to the offenders who used the victim’s credit cards to purchase weapons. Evidence from the case studies indicates that homicide situations involving profit-related circumstances do not necessarily negate a “doing gender” explanation of anti-LGBT homicide. Instead, theft may play a role in the reproduction of masculine dominance.

A fourth way to examine the context of anti-LGBT homicide is to examine the language used by homicide participants. The way antihomosexual language is used by offenders varies. Statements may be made by an offender directly toward the victim or by an offender to a co-offender regarding the victim’s gender or sexuality. In this study, we found that antihomosexual language was used in each of the responsive homicides. Terms such as “dyke” and “fag” that were used in the gay bash and undesired advance homicides revealed the inferior status assigned to homosexual men and women by offenders (see Tables 1 and 2). McCullough’s language in the gay bash homicide indicated his belief that the teenage girls were “wrong” for being romantically and sexually attracted to other females and that Gunn’s sexual orientation was inferior to heterosexuality, as it violated common expectations of femininity (see also Perry 2001; Tomsen and Mason 2001). Research has shown that assaultive and gender- and sexuality-based language in bias offenses demonstrates the offender’s expectation that women “should reciprocate [the offender’s] desire for (hetero)sexual gratification” (Tomsen and Mason 2001, 263) and that such language can be a form of “sexual harassment” that “often escalates into lesbian baiting” (Perry 2001, 117). This is observed in the gay bash homicide when McCullough responds to Gunn’s rejection by using antigay epithets. Meanwhile, in the undesired advance case, Steward’s antigay language is presumably used to emasculate Eads, while constructing Steward’s own masculinity.

It is also necessary to closely examine the context of the language usage, as offenders may not use a specifically gendered or sexualized term, but may use other derogatory terms while referring to the victim’s LGBT status. For example, during the mistaken identity homicide, Merel asked Araujo if she was a “woman” or a “sloppy ass nigga” ( The People v. Merel and Magidson 2009), which was meant to apply a derogatory term to transwomen (see Table 3). Although antihomosexual epithets were not observed in the predatory homicides, examining the language used by BMW, which usually referenced religion, outside of the immediate context of the criminal event in the representative case shows that BMW felt homosexuals were inferior to others. There is no evidence of antihomosexual language or other derogatory terms being used by the offenders in the instrumental case prior to, during, or after the homicide (see Table 5). It is important to examine language use because it shows how offenders draw boundaries between dominant and subordinate groups and how offenders justify their crimes to themselves and others. As language use is rooted in social structures, it also shows how offenders draw from macro-level forces to inform them how to properly “do” sexuality and gender.

One final and essential way to examine the context of anti-LGBT homicides is to explore the salience of gender and sexuality to the criminal event. Gender and sexuality are more relevant to certain situations than others, meaning that doing gender theory may be a better explanation of violence when offenders are presented with “challenges” to their gender or sexuality (Messerschmidt 2012). In the gay bash homicide (Table 1), McCullough attacked Gunn and her friends after they refused his propositions. The offender was prevented from “doing masculinity” because the girls did not reciprocate his sexual advance. Additionally, the affront to McCullough’s masculinity was heightened because he was in the presence of a male acquaintance and four other young lesbians who did not reciprocate his advances. These circumstances made gender and sexuality especially salient to the situation and led McCullough to assert his manhood, which Gunn had challenged, in the only way he perceived that he could—through violence. In the undesired advance case (Table 2), Steward’s manhood was challenged because another male sexually advanced on him. After initially leaving the situation, he reported back to friends. Sharing his experience and subsequently reacting with violence shows that Steward was challenged by Eads’ homosexual advance and concerned about the implications it had on Steward’s own heterosexuality, and thus his masculinity as well. However, Steward could not share his experience without also planning an act of violence that would correct the gender challenge he experienced. The relevance of gender and sexuality in the anti-LGBT homicides is most apparent in the mistaken identity homicide (Table 3). The offenders, particularly Merel, questioned their sexuality and adherence to masculine norms after they discovered they had had sex with a transwoman, someone who identified as a woman but who had male genitalia. The precursor to the criminal event showed a steady rise of aggression, as the offenders took different approaches to discover Araujo’s sex and to resolve the confusion surrounding their own sexual pursuits. Typically outward appearance is taken to accurately represent anatomical sex (West and Zimmerman 1987), but the offenders sought sex confirmation by feeling and observing Araujo’s anatomy. To the offenders, heterosexuality was central to being masculine. Once they became aware of their gender norm transgression, or the challenge to their masculinity, the offenders sought to correct their subordinated masculinities with violence to the one who affronted them—the victim.

Bufkin (1999) and Luckenbill (1977) found that lost honor or masculinity must be repaired directly after an affront in order to “save face” or restore hegemonic masculinity, whereas Messerschmidt (2012) shows that challenges to one’s sexuality or gender may be internalized in one context but repaired in another. In contrast to the responsive homicides, the predatory cases did not happen in the immediate context of an affront to the offenders’ masculinity. While this does not necessarily discount the relevance of “doing gender” to the representative homicide, it does not appear that the construction of gender or sexuality was directly relevant to the instrumental anti-LGBT homicide examined in this study. In the representative case (Table 4), there is not a specific affront to either BMW’s or James Tyler Williams’ (JTW) masculinity during the criminal event. Rather, it appears that the planning and perpetration of the anti-LGBT homicide by BMW and JTW was a product of the offenders’ upbringing and the ideologies to which they had been exposed. It is more relevant that both offenders had been raised in a heterosexist environment and had been exposed to multiple antigay and White supremacist discourses that appeared to have been internalized by BMW. Additionally, BMW may have also been questioning his own adherence to hegemonic masculine ideals, as his sexuality was questioned by friends.

In sum, it is likely that, with the exception of the instrumental homicide, offenders examined in each qualitative case study likely believed violence was the most appropriate way to correct their gender norm transgressions in those particular situations. Multiple factors played a role in the escalations of violence which all ended in homicide. The interaction between offenders, bystanders, and victims contributed to the perpetration of the criminal event in obvious ways, but it is essential to consider that the particular setting the actors found themselves in contributed to violence as well. As symbolic interactionists have suggested, offenders make decisions after assessing every facet of the situation in which they find themselves. In this study, with the exception of instrumental homicide, the social interactions produced challenges to the offenders’ gender and sexuality that could only be repaired through the commission of an anti-LGBT homicide. There are no case facts that suggest the instrumental offenders experienced gender or sexuality challenges from one another that provoked them to perpetrate the anti-LGBT homicide or that offenders received “instant positive feedback from fellow offenders” when attacking a “non-hegemonic individual” (Bufkin 1999, 163). The predatory-instrumental case is different from the predatory-representative homicide, in which the offenders had experienced challenges to their gender prior to the homicide event, and the three responsive homicides, in which gender and sexuality were salient characteristics within the situational contexts of the homicides. Research on antihomosexual killings has suggested that perpetrators’ “fury or contempt for the victims outweighed restraint” in robberies in which homosexual men were targeted (Tomsen 2009, 67), but this was not evident in this study. Here, the perpetrators appear to be a different kind of offender, driven by instrumental needs rather than symbolic ones. The offenders may have been drawing on essentialist beliefs about gay males while they planned the robbery; however, it is not apparent from available data that the offenders held disdain for homosexual men or that they were seeking to construct a dominant masculine identity by perpetrating an anti-LGBT homicide. Importantly, while we did not find that the doing gender approach was directly relevant to the instrumental homicide case, it remains possible that the actions of instrumental offenders effectively reproduced gendered social structures that shape anti-LGBT homicide, considering that the offenders’ successful violence against a homosexual man reinforced stereotypes of vulnerability associated with gay males.

Conclusion

The purpose of this study was to conduct in-depth case studies of five homicide subcategories in order to apply masculinity theories to fatal acts of anti-LGBT violence and to explain how and why these anti-LGBT homicides occurred. The homicide subcategories were identified through observable processes initiated by offenders to discriminately select LGBT victims. We also focused on one type of crime and one type of bias, which allowed us to examine the relevance of masculinity to sexual orientation and gender identity bias homicides, specifically. The study used an innovative open-source database on extremist crimes to identify anti-LGBT homicides for case studies, in addition to supplementary materials, to overcome some of the weaknesses found in official data on these serious crimes.

One of the primary goals of this study was to contribute to the literature by combining theoretical applications of sociological and criminological theory with empirical analysis of fatal acts of violence against the LGBT community. Case study findings support the notion that anti-LGBT homicide occurrences can be, at least in part, explained by existing masculinity theories for all but one anti-LGBT homicide subcategory—instrumental homicide. This is significant for several reasons. First, while scholars have theorized how constructing masculinity is relevant to bias crime offending, studies have thus far failed to use empirical data to demonstrate how this process occurs. Second, the case studies conducted in this study revealed much about the relationship between sexuality and the accomplishment of gender in the context of fatal acts of violence. For instance, findings showed how violence occurred when offenders’ gender was challenged following unwanted heterosexual advances and when offenders found themselves in sexualized situations with other males. Third, our study supports the continued application of doing gender and other masculinity theories to anti-LGBT violence. Prior research had yet to apply masculinity theories to unique situations of anti-LGBT violence like those identified in the current study. In-depth case studies provided rich descriptions of the dynamic processes offenders used to discriminately select LGBT victims for homicide and showed how unique anti-LGBT homicide selection processes emerged from different situational contexts. Findings suggested that anti-LGBT homicide is a heterogeneous phenomenon and patterns of homicide initiation and escalation vary in important ways. Though it depends on the research questions asked in future research, scholars may want to avoid conceptualizing bias crime and anti-LGBT violence specifically as a homogenous phenomenon. Instead, scholars may benefit from examining the applicability of masculinity and other theories of gendered violence to more narrowly defined categories of discriminatory crime. By doing so, research will continue to uncover the patterned behaviors of bias offenders across varied situational contexts. Finally, our findings show that the construction of gender may not be relevant to all anti-LGBT homicide situations; however, these situations may still reproduce cultural assumptions, such as LGBT persons’ vulnerability to attack. Future research should examine whether similar results are found among other anti-LGBT homicide cases.

There are some limitations of the current research. First, though our findings are consistent with prior research on bias offenders (e.g., Bufkin 1999; Perry 2001; Tomsen 2009), the current study only addressed findings from five case studies of homicide which occurred in a single country. Future research is necessary to further examine the applicability of gender and violence theories to anti-LGBT violence in the United States and cross-nationally. Second, because our study focused only on fatal anti-LGBT attacks, it is necessary for future research to compare typifications of lethal anti-LGBT violence to nonlethal anti-LGBT violence. As the case studies revealed the escalation of violence, it would be interesting to examine attempted anti-LGBT homicide to find out how the processes that result in the de-escalation of violence occur. Third, our study was not able to explore the relevance of race and ethnicity to the construction of masculinity for the offenders in this sample. It is possible that men of different racial and ethnic backgrounds draw from different social structures informing them how to “be a man,” which affects their use or disuse of violence in certain situational contexts. Future research should explore how males of different races and ethnicities may use bias violence to express their masculinity similarly and differently. Finally, as the mistaken identity case study shows, violence against transgender victims is inordinately complex and unique from violence against gay and lesbian victims in many ways. Future research should be careful to study antitransgender violence as its own phenomenon, rather than collapsing it within research focusing primarily on antisexual orientation bias crimes.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: Portions of this research were supported by the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate's directly and through the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) via research and education grants. The views and conclusions contained in this document are those of the authors and should not be interpreted as necessarily representing the official policies, either expressed or implied, of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security or the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START).

Notes

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