However, Vallum has never contested testimony and evidence that he long knew Williamson was transgender. He declined to speak with The Associated Press in a March letter, citing advice from his lawyers, and didn’t address the issue Monday. Josh Vallum, aka King Chaos, claimed he killed Williamson after he reached between her legs and realized she had a penis. He said he “blacked out” and doesn’t remember the crime, a variation of what’s known as a “gay panic” or “trans panic” defense. Vallum initially told sheriff’s deputies and later told The Sun Herald newspaper that he found out that Williamson had a penis on moments before he killed her. Vallum can’t go back and undo what he did to Mercedes,” Allred said. ![]() “It’s difficult to image how a mother could lock a two- or three-year-old child in a room for house on end while adults did drugs.”Īllred said Vallum first tried to kill himself when he was 7 or 8. Joshua Brandon Vallum, 29, of Lucedale, Mississippi, pleaded guilty today to a federal hate crime for assaulting and murdering Mercedes Williamson because. to be sentenced on federal hate-crime charges for killing a transgender person, the Associated Press reports. Vallum lived through a childhood that was characterized by abandonment and neglect,” said public defender Ellen Allred. On Monday, Joshua Brandon Vallum will become the first person in the U.S. Public defenders submitted a sealed brief Monday to Guirola outlining Vallum’s troubles. When Williamson tried to run, they said, Vallum chased her and bashed her head with a hammer. The case was unprecedented for the Justice Department. They added he shocked her with a stun gun and stabbed her with a pocketknife. Joshua Brandon Vallum's sentence, which was rendered Monday, comes on top of the life sentence he is already serving under state law. ![]() Vallum lured Williamson into a car in Alabama and drove her 50 miles (80 kilometers) to his family home near Lucedale, Mississippi, prosecutors said. Pixabay is a vibrant community of creatives, sharing royalty free images, videos and music. Joshua Vellum pleads guilty to murder of transgender woman. ![]() “These actions invite increased discrimination and continued animus against transgender people,” Gordon said.įederal prosecutor Julia Gegenheimer had said at Vallum’s plea hearing in December that he began planning to kill Williamson after a friend called him in May 2015 to say he’d discovered Williamson’s identity. She cited the Trump administration’s reversal of guidelines that transgender students nationwide should be able to use school bathrooms corresponding to their gender identity - among other steps. Joshua Brandon Vallum, 29, of Lucedale, Mississippi, was sentenced today in the Southern District of Mississippi to 49 years in prison for assaulting and murdering Mercedes Williamson because she was a transgender woman, announced Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Acting Assistant Attorney General Tom Wheeler of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, Acting U.S. Gordon said her group remains concerned how Trump policies will affect transgender people. He admitted to killing her in 2015 after they ended their relationship, in an effort to keep the fact that she was transgender a secret. Joshua Vallum is the first to be convicted for targeting a transgender person. LGBT advocates applauded federal officials’ first use of the 2009 hate crimes law to prosecute an offense against a transgender person.ĭemoya Gordon, attorney for the Transgender Rights Project of Lambda Legal, called the prosecution “significant” but noted it began under President Barack Obama’s administration and added “the cake was already baked” on Vallum’s sentencing when Donald Trump became president. In December 2016, Joshua Vallum pleaded guilty to hate crime charges in the death of his then-17-year-old transgender girlfriend, Mercedes Williamson. A Mississippi man was sentenced to 49 years on Monday for the hate crime of killing his transgender ex-girlfriend.
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