ATLANTA
—
Matthew
Shepard.
Billy
Jack
Gaither.
Scott
Amedure,
the
guest
who
revealed
his
gay
crush
on
the
“Jenny
Jones”
show.
When
the
nation’s
first-ever
symposium
on
“Defeating
the
Gay
Panic
Defense”
convened
in
Atlanta
last
week,
many
of
the
cases
featured
in
the
opening
video
presentation
were
familiar
to
those
who
followed
the
highest
profile
anti-gay
killings
of
recent
years.
But
one
name
that
never
made
national
headlines
loomed
largest
during
the
three-day
forum
for
criminal
justice
and
law
enforcement
officials:
Ahmed
Dabarran.
An
assistant
district
attorney
in
Fulton
County,
Dabarran
was
killed
May
6,
2001,
in
his
Cobb
County
apartment.
“For
many
prosecutors,
the
gay
panic
defense
may
be
an
academic
thing,
but
for
us
it
is
very
personal,”
Fulton
District
Attorney
Paul
Howard
said
during
the
symposium’s
opening
session
on
Feb.
24.
Like
the
men
who
murdered
Shepard
and
the
other
higher-profile
victims,
Dabarran’s
accused
killer
attempted
to
excuse
his
actions
by
claiming
they
were
necessary
to
fend
off
unwanted
sexual
advances
—
a
strategy
dubbed
the
“gay
panic
defense.”
Unheard
of
in
heterosexual
contexts
or
among
women
who
kill
women,
experts
say
the
defense
thrives
on
a
culture
that
raises
men
to
believe
that
homosexuality
is
a
threat
against
masculinity,
and
that
masculinity
must
be
maintained
at
any
expense.
In
Dabarran’s
case,
it
worked.
On
Feb.
28,
2003,
a
Cobb
County
Superior
Court
jury
acquitted
Roderiqus
Reshad
Reed
of
murder
and
all
other
charges
in
Dabarran’s
death.
Reed’s
attorneys
focused
on
allegations
that
Dabarran
—
who
was
born
in
Somalia
and
had
a
wife
from
an
arranged
marriage,
although
they
did
not
live
together
—
led
a
secret
gay
life.
According
to
the
defense,
Dabarran
lured
Reed
to
his
apartment
with
promises
of
a
party
“with
girls,”
and
then
performed
oral
sex
on
Reed
while
another
man
pointed
a
gun
at
him.
While
Reed
took
Dabarran’s
cell
phone,
car
and
identification
and
admitted
in
court
testimony
to
hitting
Dabarran
several
times
in
the
head,
his
attorneys
contended
the
actions
were
justified
to
escape,
although
Cobb
prosecutors
argued
that
Dabarran
was
asleep
at
the
time.
Critics
claimed
the
Cobb
assistant
district
attorney
who
handled
the
case
failed
to
counter
the
defense
strategy
of
demonizing
Dabarran.
Prosecutor
Tom
Cole
and
District
Attorney
Pat
Head
refused
comment
at
the
time
on
their
handling
of
the
case.
Meanwhile,
the
outcome
continues
to
haunt
Dabarran’s
coworkers
in
the
Fulton
District
Attorney’s
office.
“One
of
our
own
was
brutally
murdered,
and
his
murderer
walked
away
with
absolutely
no
justice,”
Holly
Hughes,
a
Fulton
prosecutor
who
heads
up
the
county’s
hate
crimes
unit,
said
at
the
symposium.
A
desire
to
see
some
good
come
from
Dabarran’s
death
prompted
the
Fulton
office
to
put
on
the
ground-breaking
forum.
“I
never
got
the
impression
the
Cobb
County
prosecutors
threw
the
case,
or
that
they
were
not
well-meaning
and
didn’t
intend
to
get
a
conviction,”
Howard
said.
“But
as
I
have
talked
with
other
people
about
the
case,
what
I’ve
found
is
there
is
really
a
lack
of
knowledge
about
gay
panic.
…
“So
I
said
to
my
staff,
‘We
ought
to
not
just
complain
about
this,
but
we
should
do
something
to
help
others
learn
about
it.’”
The
Feb.
23-25
symposium
offered
continuing
education
credits
for
attorneys
and
law
enforcement
officials.
It
featured
a
wide
range
of
discussions,
from
panels
on
broader
social
issues
to
more
practical
advice
on
how
to
ward
off
the
strategy
through
initial
police
interrogations,
jury
selection
and
prosecutors’
opening
and
closing
statements
to
jurors.
Co-hosted
by
the
Atlanta
Police
Department
and
the
FBI’s
Atlanta
office,
the
event
drew
145
registered
attendees,
according
to
Erik
Friedly,
spokesperson
for
the
Fulton
district
attorney.
Most
attendees
were
from
jurisdictions
in
the
metropolitan
Atlanta
area.
Representatives
from
the
FBI,
Georgia
Bureau
of
Investigations
and
the
U.S.
Attorney’s
Office
for
the
Northern
District
of
Georgia
also
participated,
Friedly
said.
One
local
district
attorney’s
office
was
notably
absent.
“Where
the
hell
is
Cobb
County?”
asked
Bernadette
Hernandez,
a
gay
investigator
with
the
Fulton
district
attorney’s
office,
during
a
Feb.
25
town
hall
meeting
wrapping
up
the
event.
No
one
from
the
Cobb
district
attorney’s
office,
which
prosecuted
the
Dabarran
case,
registered
to
attend
the
symposium,
Friedly
confirmed.
But
the
Cobb
County
Police
Department
did
send
an
officer.
“The
Ahmed
Dabarran
case
was
in
Cobb
County,
and
our
deputy
chief
wanted
somebody
here
to
represent
the
police
department,”
Cobb
Det.
Richard
Plunkett
said.
Cobb
prosecutors
could
not
be
reached
for
comment.
Presenters
at
the
gay
panic
symposium
included
prosecutors,
police
officers
and
activists.
Jeffrey
Montgomery,
executive
director
of
Michigan’s
Triangle
Foundation
and
a
board
member
for
the
National
Coalition
of
Anti-Violence
Projects,
has
consulted
on
numerous
gay
panic
cases
and
decried
the
“insidious
nature”
of
the
defense.
“The
only
way
to
succeed
with
a
gay
panic
defense
is
to
dehumanize
and
defame
the
victim,”
Montgomery
said.
Defense
attorneys
aren’t
the
only
ones
to
blame
when
it
works,
Howard
noted.
“The
community
has
to
face
the
face
that
if
[anti-gay]
bias
didn’t
exist,
the
lawyers
wouldn’t
try
to
use
it,”
he
said.
But
while
the
tactic
may
influence
jurors,
the
gay
panic
defense
is
not
a
formal
legal
defense
as
defined
by
criminal
law
...
