The man charged with the brutal murder of gay Puerto Rican teen Jorge Steven Lopez Mercado has been deemed mentally fit to stand trial, Edge reports: "Territorial psychologist Rafael Cabrera reported his findings to Judge Miriam Camila Justino during a hearing in Caguas earlier this morning. Local authorities contend Juan José Martínez Matos murdered Jorge Steven López Mercado last November before dumping his decapitated, dismembered and partially burned body along a remote roadside. "The quest for justice has begun," Pedro Julio Serrano of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force told EDGE in a text message sent from ...

This afternoon I received word from activist Pedro Julio Serrano as well as Chris Pagan (who filed an early iReport on the crime) that the Feds are keeping a close eye on the investigation into the hate crime murder of Jorge Steven Lopez MercadoIn November Mercado's decapitated, dismembered, and partially charred body was found by the side of a road in Puerto Rico. The police investigator suggested that he deserved what he got because of the "type of lifestyle" he was leading. Juan Martinez Matos has been charged with first-degree murder for Mercado's death. Serrano provided translation ...

Pat Mulder, Ryan Skipper’s mother, reacts Monday at the sentencing hearing where her son’s killer was given two life sentences Ledger photo by Rick Runion A central Florida man was sentenced this week to two life terms for a 2007 killing that the victim’s parents and LGBT advocates have called a hate crime. A Polk County judge sentenced 23-year-old William Brown Jr. Monday, after he was convicted of first-degree murder by a jury last month for for his part in the robbery and stabbing death of Ryan Keith Skipper, an out gay student who attended Lakeland's Traviss ...

Jayson Mattison, Jr (Photos supplied by friends to Baltimore Sun) At a of a West Baltimore church Wednesday morning, an overflow crowd spilled out of the sanctuary and into the vestibule for the funeral of Jason Mattison Jr., a gay 15-year-old killed last week in a brutal attack at his family’s home. “No one is truly gone if you carry them in your heart,” Starletta Jackson, principal of Jason’s high school, said at the funeral. “And Jason is a part of our heart. We all knew that Jason wanted to be a pediatrician. There was ...

More insight into the murder of gay 19-year-old Jorge Steven Lopez Mercado, whose killer was arrested yesterday. Christopher Pagan, whose original iReport was the first I learned of the crime, has been following it. It appears that the killer, 26-year-old Juan Antonio Martínez Matos, originally believed his victim was a female prostitute. Writes Pagan: "He said that he did not know that it was really a man and they went to his apartment in Cidra, where Steven allegedly told him to have anal sex with him, which provoked anger in him and caused him to ...

William Brown Jr. has been found guilty of first degree murder and robbery in the March 2007 death of Ryan Keith Skipper: "The verdict was announced at 2:56 p.m. Jurors had been deliberating since 12:34 p.m. Brown will be sentenced to life in prison Dec. 1. During this morning's closing arguments, Assistant State Attorney Cass Castillo rejected Brown's statement to detectives that he 'blacked out' during the 2007 stabbing attack." In March 2007, Skipper's body was found by the side of a rural road in central Florida with more than 20 stab wounds. His car and laptop had been ...