Press Ignores Vigil for Grandmother Murdered by Homosexual Man 11/18/2005
By Robert Knight
CWA of Illinois leader attends event memorializing Mary Stachowicz’s death.
The national and local press ignored a pro-family vigil last Sunday evening in Chicago on behalf of Mary Stachowicz, the grandmother who was murdered three years ago after sharing her faith with a homosexual tenant.
Mrs. Stachowicz, 51, a devout Catholic, had told her tenant, Nicholas Gutierrez, 19, that she felt he was sinning against God, and she encouraged him to change his ways. This enraged Gutierrez, who allegedly beat and stabbed her to death on November 13, 2002, then hid her body in a crawlspace. His trial is slated for later this month.
Unlike the death of Matthew Shepard, the Wyoming college student murdered by two thugs in a 1998 robbery, the press did not feature Mrs. Stachowicz’s death as a “hate crime,” exposing a liberal double standard in defining “hate crimes.”
“We thought it was important to the public to know that Mary was killed for sharing her faith,” said Kathy Valente, state director of Concerned Women for America (CWA) of Illinois, who attended the vigil. “Equally as tragic as Mary’s death is the death sentence imposed on people who are enslaved in this deadly behavior.”
Just after the killing, some homosexual activists made a shocking series of comments, revealed in a CWA Web article.
Peter LaBarbera, former policy analyst at CWA’s Culture & Family Institute who now heads the Illinois Family Institute, wrote about Sunday’s vigil and the press reaction. More.
“Given the lop-sided coverage of ‘hate crimes’ involving homosexual victims, the press’ unwillingness to give Mary Stachowicz’s vigil any attention shows their bias," said CWA's Valente. "If something promotes homosexuality, they’re all over it, but if it reflects badly on homosexuality, they find other things to cover.”