Let’s treat everyone equally under the law

If someone is enraged enough to carry out a violent crime, the race, ethnicity, gender and sexual orientation of the victim shouldn't matter for purposes of sentencing. Laws that prohibit murder, rape, battery and other offenses and require harsh punishments are supposed to provide equal protection.

But legislation that imposes tougher sentences for crimes committed against specific classes of people -- such as Senate Bill 180, which would enhance penalties for anyone convicted of attacking transgender people -- has the effect of cheapening the lives outside those privileged groups.

Someone who kills an average heterosexual man over a drug debt or a lack of cooperation in a robbery could face fewer years in prison than someone who murders a man who considers himself a woman, regardless of the circumstance.

SB180, sponsored by David Parks, D-Las Vegas, would add "gender identity or expression" to the growing list of aggravating factors that boost prison sentences for violent offenders, such as race, religion and sexual orientation. Passage of the bill could result in an extra year to 20 years in prison for anyone convicted of harming a transgender person.

Advocates for the bill make an emotional case based on bullying, intimidation and acts of violence suffered by transgender people. They believe such "hate crime" protections are deterrents that prevent violent crime.

But if that were true, laws against kidnapping, sexual assault and false imprisonment would be deterrent enough.

In fact, proposals such as SB180 end up creating "thought crimes," where killing a spouse for cheating is a less severe crime than killing someone because of racist beliefs.

Besides, don't advocates for transgender people make great efforts to educate people about the relative normalcy of their lives, and how they're just like you and me, save for how they identify their gender? SB180 has the effect of segregating them into a victim class.

"You have to hate somebody pretty bad to beat them to death. The penalties should be evenly applied," Washoe County public defender Orrin Johnson said Monday, testifying against the bill. "All these crimes are crimes against a human being."