Saw this yesterday. He stomped the guy to death.

He couldn’t in any way tell that “Angie” wasn’t Angie?

After having sex of some sort? Sounds like a fishy alibi.

The rednecks that hate gay people will be defending a black man beating and killing the white man.
Especially since it’s a heterosexual football player for the local team.

There's no 'straight white gun-toting Christian hero' to promulgate the interests of, ergo, I'd imagine it will be ignored.

If they talk about it, it will be only to yammer on about how 'liberals don't know how to deal with it because the killer is black and the victim is white, but gay'.

Which is, of course, not true, but ... we know how they roll.

Heavens. He'll keep prison psychiatrists busy for decades.

From the pic and paucity of facts in the article, it doesn't appear as though Angie was transgender, but rather simply advertising on Tinder with a woman's name.

Seems likely it's a case where the student engaged in sex with a man, which he was aware of at the time, apparently later regretted it, and went back and murdered the guy over it, and his cover story is that he was tricked.

And I am dumbfounded that this murderer is out on bail. You have to be fucking kidding me.

His alibi is shaky at best.

transitioned since the photo shown was taken ... but either way it's absolutely no f***ing excuse whatsoever.

And it's a pretty serious affront in my esteem that he's out on 75K bail for what appears to be a first degree murder case.

Must be a big game coming up or something. Perhaps there's some major investment in this teen.

He needs to be in jail for a long time. Murder is murder and it's not okay.

What it most certainly feels like, regardless, is a GLARING slap in the face to the world at large WRT the perceived value of LGBTQ lives in the eyes of the judge who set this bail.

$75K bond means you pay the bail bondsman $7500 and you walk.

Despite the fact that he's admitting killing this man. It's not even in question, apparently.

Gotta be kidding me

Because there is no reason to act like 'teh gheys' have the same rights as 'normal' people. To this day, that mindset is prevalent in plenty of cities/states.

Well after the fact.

I think some states now have done away with that defense.

The ‘gay panic defense’ is a legal strategy in which a defendant claims they acted in a state of violent, temporary insanity, committing assault or murder, because of unwanted same-sex sexual advances. A defendant may allege to have found the same-sex sexual advances so offensive or frightening that they were provoked into reacting, were acting in self-defense, were of diminished capacity, or were temporarily insane, and that this circumstance is exculpatory or mitigating.

The ‘trans panic defense’ is a closely related legal strategy applied in cases of assault, manslaughter, or murder of a transgender individual with whom the assailant(s) had engaged in or was close to engaging in sexual relations with and claim to have been unaware that the victim was transgender, producing in the attacker an alleged trans panic reaction, often a manifestation of homophobia and transphobia.

They are often used by men to justify hate-crimes or the intentional assault or murder of gay men or trans women.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gay_panic_defense

Amazing.

because he is not a threat to society? That judge must be a hell of a football fan.

😖

50 millions years ago (1990-1991, but it seems that long ago), I was in a band that often played in Blacksburg. I always enjoyed my time there, but it was still Virginia, it was still the South, and regardless of the pretty posters and all the nice talk, racism and bigotry were still in full display. And, the jocks were still jocks, even if a number of them were big fans. I agree with the other person who said that this sounds like a meetup that happened, then the jock turned on him... probably because word was about to get out, or he knew someone was going to find out. Of course, bear in mind that 'sexual encounter' can mean a quick hand job, so it is very possible that he did not realize that this was a guy on that first meeting (we won't discuss why someone eighteen years old was with a 40 year old, regardless of how much this smacks of a 'paid encounter'), but seeing as it could have been simple to just leave it alone tells me that either someone else found out, or someone was looking like they were going to find out.

This labeling him forever C. He’s not a stranger to violence

Maybe he really didn’t know the first time. They rebooked up so either he still didn’t know or he was planning on doing this. Either way I think he didn’t want anyone to know.

... obviously that kind of reaction wasn't justified!

Just chalk it up to the risk of trying to meet anyone that way, and peacefully leave!

That's premeditated murder. 1st degree murder, not 2nd degree, in my non-legal opinion