Injustice

A mistrial has been declared in the trial of Gwen Araujo's murderers. The jury allegedly deadlocked on the question of whether the defendants were guilty of first-degree murder - "7 to 5 in favor of convicting Magidson of first-degree murder and 10 to 2 in favor of acquitting both Merel and Cazares of first-degree murder."

Let us briefly review the facts of the case. Magidson and Merel, who both had a sexual relationship with Gwen Araujo... a transgendered teenager (living as a woman, biologically male)... began to suspect she might be male. Upon determining that she was in fact a man, they "the men slapped, punched, kicked, kneed, choked and strangled Araujo in the Merel home in Newark in the early morning hours of Oct. 4, 2002... includ[ing] blows by Merel to the victim's head with a can and a skillet." Then, "the men loaded Araujo's body into the bed of Magidson's pickup truck and drove several hours to the Sierra foothills in El Dorado County. They dug a grave and buried the teen's corpse."

That's a mighty elaborate "crime of passion." A gang of four beating a teenager to death, then driving for hours to bury the body...

But that is precisely why the jury hung. Now, I'm not going to defend Arajuo's behavior. Her relationship with these men was clearly based upon a dishonest representation of herself. No matter how fervently she might have wished to be a "natural-born woman" there were biological "facts on the ground" that would have mattered very much to her partners, and it was wrong to withhold that information.

Is it a transgression so grave that it warrants death at the hands of a miniature mob and a shallow grave in the mountains?

Never in a million years.

The deadlock apparently occurred in the decision of whether the acts amounted to murder in the first degree or the second. Though a finding of second-degree would at least be a measure of justice (albeit one which would have assigned too much blame to the victim), a declaration of deadlock provides none.