AVP was on the national stage once again as AVP’s Director of Community Organizing and Public Advocacy, Audacia Ray (they/she), testified in front of The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights during their public briefing on Racial Disparities in Violent Crime Victimization in the United States on Friday, November 17th in Washington D.C.
Sharing the history of AVP’s work at the intersections of multi-marginalized groups, particularly LGBTQ+ people of color, Ray pointed to the failings of police reporting and of how crimes against transgender people are fundamentally mishandled. Speaking to current events, Ray recalled the recent, horrifying case of DeAndre Matthews, a 19-year-old black, cisgender gay man who was found with a bullet wound to his head and burned to death in Brooklyn, New York. Ray highlighted AVP’s immediate work with the Matthews Family in the immediate aftermath of DeAndre’s death and pointed to need of acknowledging multiple-biases in such violence, as the NYPD declined to pursue hate crime charges due to the suspected perpetrator being an intimate partner of DeAndre.
The testimony was rounded out by Ray articulating the imperative of government to condemn targeted violence against LGBTQ+ communities of color along with providing an active and comprehensive role in preventing violence experienced by those with multiply-marginalized identities across race, sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity.
Watch Audacia Ray’s full testimony below.