Date Rape, Hate Crimes May Get Hill Attention

Black Issues in Higher Education, Feb 4, 1999 by Charles Dervarics

Date rape and hate crimes affecting college students are the locus of a new legislative initiative from Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-Texas), a Congressional Black Caucus member.

One of her new bills would raise the maximum penalties for possession and distribution of GHB, a drug implicated in several date rape cases. The bill, H.R. 75, also would increase penalties for Ketamine, another drug targeted by police in sexual assaults.

Jackson-Lee introduced the bill after learning of a date rape case in her district involving drugs, a staff member said. Date-rape drugs are used to incapacitate a victim or affect her ability to recall an incident.

"There was bipartisan support for this bill last year," says Maurice Houston, a spokesman for Jackson-Lee. But hopes of attaching it to a year-end funding bill ended when Congress was forced by time constraints to enact a large, omnibus bill to fund most government programs.

The second bill, the Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 1999, would impose stricter jail terms on those convicted of serious crimes that also involve acts of hate based on a victim's race, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.

The hate crime bill is a priority for many higher education organizations in the wake of Matthew Shepard's death, said Jamie Pueschel, legislative director for the United States Student Association. Shepard was a University of Wyoming student who police say was attacked and murdered in part because he was gay.

"A lot of education groups are getting behind the plan this year" in hopes of enactment, Pueschel says.

In Jackson-Lee's home state last year, an African American also was the victim of an apparent hate crime when he was tied to a truck and dragged to his death.