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The David Ray Hate Crimes Prevention Act or, David's law, was a bill introduced on January 7, 2009 in the United States House of Representatives by Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee to enhance Federal enforcement of laws regarding Hate crimes. The new bill was introduced because the existing Federal law was considered inadequate to address violence that is motivated by race, colour, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, gender and disability of the victim. It was also created to make sexual orientation, like race and gender, a protected class. The new bill called for the revision of Section 245 of title 18 of the United States Code, as well as the addition of a subsection outlining the punishment for anyone found guilty of a hate crime.

Background

2006 Harris County, Texas hate crime assault

On April 23rd, 2006 16-year-old David Ray Ritcheson was savagely beaten while attending a high school party at his friend's, Gus Sons, house in a Houston suburb in Spring, Texas. The attack was done by two other youths, one of whom was a skin head who uttered racial slurs against the Mexican American, and attacked him for kissing a white girl, Sons' younger sister Danielle, who was much younger than the victim.

David was punched unconscious, dragged outside and stripped naked, kicked in the head, suffered 17 cigarette burns, had bleach poured on his face and body, and was assaulted with a pipe that caused damage to his internal organs. The attack resulted in David being in the hospital for 3 months and 8 days, most of which was spent in critical care.

As a result of this beating, David had to under go 30 surgeries to correct the damage that was done to his internal organs. After refusing professional help and not speaking with friends or family about the event and attempting to forget the attack happened by burying the memory and pretending that it didn't happen, David committed Suicide a year after the attack by jumping off of a boat .

Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee

After speaking to David after the story became national news, Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee, who represents the 18th Congressional of Texas , spoke to Congress about David's Law and what it means for victims of hate crimes. She called David's suicide a ' wake-up call to the Nation of the need to redouble our efforts to prevent hate crimes by juveniles, which I believe is, in the long run, the best and most effective way of eliminating the scourge of hate-motivated crimes from our society,' . She stated that during his short life, David became a advocate for Federal hate crimes legislative, and showed true courage in light of the heinous crimes that had been done against him. Jackson-lee also wanted to introduce legislation that would introduce support, psychological and emotional, services to the victims of hate crimes and their families .

Hate Crime

A Hate crime is a crime, usually violent, motivated by prejudice or intolerance toward a member of a gender, racial, religious, or social group . These groupings are normally referred to as a Protected class, which David's Law was attempting to include sexual orientation as apart of these groupings. Hate crimes are put into place to dissuade future hate related crimes from being committed against members of the protected classes, and differ from laws against other laws for crimes such as Hate speech. Once the assault against David gained national attention, the law was called to be rewritten to include crimes that were done on private dwellings as victims of violent crimes weren't always covered under the federal hate crimes act.

David's Fight

Speaking Out

After David's case drew national attention, he spoke out to the United States House of Representatives Judiciary Subcommittee about passing more stricter hate crime laws to protect future victims of hate crimes that the current law did not cover. David wanted the current law to be amended, as the attack done on him wasn't considered a hate crime under Federal law, and charges for a hate crime weren't originally charged on the two youths who attacked him , as the original bill, Section 245 of title 18 of the United States Code, only considered a crime a hate crime when the crime occurs in a public area,. David believed that other crimes similar to the one done to him would be committed , and the current bill didn't protect those victims that would be attacked as David was on private property.

Attackers

Although David never met his attackers before that night, both David Tuck, who was 18 at the time of the assault, and Keith Turner, who was 17 at the time, were fellow students at Klein Collins High School.

David Tuck was a known White supremacist with nazis tattoos, and had a history of of violence that ranged from beatings to animal abuse . During the five hour beating Tuck kicked David with his steel toed boots and sodomized him with a pipe while yelling racial slurs. It was found out during the trial that it was Turner's idea to use the pipe during the attack .

Keith Turner also participated in the beating, Torture and Sexual assault of David, which included dousing David in bleach to erase the evidence of the attack and leaving him, naked and unconscious, for hours until Gus and Danielle Sons woke their Mother up and told her about the attack that she had slept through. She called the police in the early hours of the morning, not sure if David would survive.

Conviction and Legal Punishment

In December 2006, both Tuck and Turner went on trial and were convicted of Aggravated sexual assault for their attack of David. Tuck was sentenced to Life in prison, which was fueled by the Prosecution, Mike Trent, stating that Tuck's past criminal record shows that he would continue to commit violent acts and could not be rehabilitated . Turner was sentenced to 90 years for his participation in the crime, and will have to serve at least 30 years of his sentence before he is considered for parole .

For original Wikipedia posts in regards to David's Law and the assault that set the events into most, click the links provided: David Ray Hate Crimes Prevention Act or 2006 Harris County, Texas hate crime assault.