The D.C. Council on Tuesday, Dec. 15, voted unanimously to give final approval of a bill that bans the use of the so-called gay and transgender panic defense in criminal trials.
A coalition of local LGBTQ advocacy groups that lobbied for the legislation said it is needed to prevent defense attorneys from inappropriately asking juries to find that a victim’s sexual orientation or gender identity or gender expression is to blame for a defendant’s criminal act, including murder.
The attorneys have argued that their clients “panicked” after discovering the person against whom they committed a violent crime was gay or transgender, prompting them to act in a way they believed to be a form of self-defense.