U.S. Indicts 1st Anti-Gay Hate Crime

For the first time in history, the United States has issued an indictment in hate crime case involving a crime against an individual based on their sexual orientation, the Justice Department said Thursday:

A federal grand jury in London, Ky., returned a three-count indictment charging David Jason Jenkins, 37, and Anthony Ray Jenkins, 20, for kidnapping and assaulting Kevin Pennington, and for conspiring with each other and with other unnamed individuals to commit the kidnapping. The indictment charges the men with committing a hate crime in violation of the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, which expanded federal jurisdiction to include certain assaults motivated by someone’s sexual orientation.