Boy Murdered by Would-Be Valentine: One Year Later

On February 12, 2008, 15-year-old Lawrence (Larry) King was shot in the back of the head by classmate Brandon McInerney. Larry had recently told his classmates that he was bisexual, and the day before the murder Larry had asked Brandon to be his Valentine.

I’ve been looking online for information about the murder, but finding an unbiased source is surprisingly difficult. Until Ellen DeGeneres mentioned the murder on her daytime talk show, it hadn’t been reported by most media outlets. Much of the media attention after that focused on not-so-subtly blaming Larry.

Both TIME‘s John Cloud and Newsweek‘s Ramin Setoodeh opened their articles with mentions of Larry’s affection for makeup and women’s shoes.

Setoodeh says that Larry “was a troubled child who flaunted his sexuality and wielded it like a weapon” when he was (frequently) abused around the school. In an uncredited AP article, psychology professor Jaana Juvonen blames Larry for flirting, saying “[flirting with a boy] can be very threatening to someone’s ego and their sense of identity.”

Meanwhile the murderer is introduced by Cloud as “a sweet-faced boy”. It’s only later that we learn that Brandon McInerney was fascinated with Adolf Hitler and “knew all about the Nuremberg trials and all the names of Hitler’s deputies”. There’s whispered talk of a confrontation the afternoon of the murder, but no details are forthcoming. Buried deep within the Newsweek article we also find out that one Larry’s friends reported after the shooting that Brandon had passed her that afternoon and told her to “say goodbye to Larry, because she would never see him again.”

All of the mainstream sources seem to be uncomfortable connecting the murder to the murderer. Larry was the Other. He was different. Somehow it must have been his fault.

And he was different. Not long before he was killed, Larry had asked his friends and teachers to call him Leticia. In fact, those were the last words he wrote that day in English class, right before Brandon stood up in a room full of students, pulled out a handgun, and calmly shot him twice in the head.

I do feel some compassion for Brandon. We know that he had some trouble at home, and he was only 14 years old at the time of the murder. But there is one person to blame for this crime, and it is not the victim.

It’s been a year since Larry Leticia was murdered. Lawsuits are pending, including one by his parents against the school for letting him wear necklaces and heels. (It’s been reported that Dad hasn’t accepted Leticia’s sexuality.) Brandon McInerney hasn’t stood trial yet. Preliminary hearings have been rescheduled (again) for March.

Hopefully by next Valentine’s Day something will have been decided. Also hopefully by this time next year harassment of LGBT kids in school will decline. Until then, rest in peace, Leticia.