Warning: This story contains the mention of torture and violence.
The brutal murder of 24-year-old Nordquist Sam, a transgender man killed in New York, after being tormented for more than a month in the implementation of the Crime Act, he called “outside the perverted”, provoked vigil across the US and in Canada as mourning 2SLGBTQ+ communities.
Although the terrible details of the case withdrew the supervision of the officials and the Trans Proponent, the police warn of the speculation of the perpetrator’s motives, saying that at this stage there was no evidence that it was a crime from hatred – noting that the suspect and Nordquist knew and identified as 2SLGBTQ+.
However, as the investigation develops on the background of the decrease in Trump administration to legal protection for trans people, Trans Proponents suggest that it is crucial that all the motivations for the crime be examined at a time when their community members are particularly vulnerable.
Seven people are charged with second -degree murder in accordance with the belittled indifference statute, including a woman believed to be an internet girl who went to New York.
Starting in early December, Nordquist was undergoing “repeated acts of violence and torture”, which led to his death, Kelly Swift, Captain of the Criminal Investigation Institute with New York State Police, said at a press conference on February 14th.
“In my 20-year career for law enforcement, this is one of the most terrifying crimes I have ever explored,” Swift told reporters.
The case of missing persons becomes a case of murder
In September 2024, Nordquist originally traveled from his home country of Minnesota to New York, and was last in contact with family members in late January 2025.
A few days after it was officially recorded as a disappearance on February 9, police searched the Motel at Canandaigu, NY, where Nordquist was staying with several other people and later discovered his remains in the field in the neighboring Yatetes.
Nordquist was subjected to “prolonged physical and psychological abuse in the hands of more individuals,” Swift said, and his body was moved in an attempt to conceal the crime.
“The facts and circumstances of this crime are beyond the perverted,” said Ontario Jim Ritts district prosecutor at a press conference. “No human being should endure what he has endured himself.”
Nordquist’s mother, Linda Nordquist, said NBC News That her son went to New York to see her ex-partner, a 38-year-old valuable Arzuag, who is one of the seven suspects in Nordquist’s death.
Discussion of hate crime
In response to public control, New York State Police and Ontario County District Attorney’s Office announced a joint statement on February 16, declaring that they do not currently “indicate” that murder is a hate crime.
“In order to alleviate understandable concern, his murder could be a crime from hatred, we discover that his attackers were also known to each other, identified as LGBTQ+, and at least one of the accused lived with the very time period he led to” his death, and the statement was divided by CBC News.
He added that the police “divide the shock of the community with such a terrible act of violence and understands the fear that is circulating among members of the LGBTQ+community,” and will follow all the guides on the motif behind what happened.
The police statement, however, still leaves many questions without answering and echoes the “misconception” that hate crimes have to commit foreigners, said Barbara Perry, a hate crime expert and director of the Hate, Bias and Extremism Center at Ontario Tech University.
The alleged perpetrators who are part of the 2SLGBTQ+ community also do not remove the possibility that Transphobia is a motivating factor in Nordquist’s murder, she said.
“Even within that wide beam of communities, there is an anti-trans.”
According to the Law of the State of New York, a hate crime is committed “in full or in a significant part” for believing or perception of race, gender, religion, gender identity or gender expression, among other categories.
The need to prove that bias has played a “significant” role can add difficulty to clarify him as a hate crime, Perry said.
It is unclear whether in this case it would provide a legal advantage; Hate crime label can increase the severity of a smaller act such as harassment or attack and triggering a sharp sentence, but in the event of murder, prosecutors would already ask for a maximum sentence, Perry said.
However, many members of the 2SLGBTQ+ community want a greater transparency about the decision not to investigate Nordquist’s death as a hate crime, Perry said, adding that it is “a very important statement to the community that these are accepted by the effects of that Ripple.”
“We see a lot of activities online that complains about the police response,” she said.
“It created demands for change, but it was also created and worsened by the fear that already exists.”
On Monday, people gathered in front of the Ontario County Court, calling for justice. Pflag Nyc and the agenda of pride held a vigilance of memories last Friday in the Manhattan neighborhood in West Village, and hundreds packed up to church to lay flowers and sorrows.
On Friday night, people gathered on the steps of the mannitobe legislative authorities to pray and light candles for three people who recently died in the United States. Organizers say that people on either side of the boundary of damage to growing transphobic rhetoric and violence.
New York government Kathy Hochul said in statement On February 16, that “she ordered the state police to provide any support and resources to the District Prosecutor as they continue the investigation, including whether this is a hate crime.”
2Slgbtq+ advocates noted that, whether he considers Nordquist’s murder, a hatred crime, the case emphasizes the risk of violence that trans people face.
“About 30 percent of the transactions of the murders in the last year were committed by someone known to the victim’s streaming intimate partners,” the project against Violence on February 16th said a statement.
‘State sanctioned’
The murder comes in the midst of the wave of legislative attacks on the Trans Right in the US since he assumed his duty in January, US President Donald Trump abolished executive commands in the fight against discrimination of 2SLGBTQ+ people, stated that he would now recognize only two sexes and signed commands banned by transgender persons from the referee.
The court challenges have stopped a number of Trump’s executive commands, but it’s still a “really scary time” for trance people, said Dean Spade, a professor at the University of Seattl, for CBC News.
“In some ways, the private violence that is now happening is sanctioned, because the narrative comes so directly from the Government that our lives are worthless and that we are available,” he said.
However, although it is important to appoint violence against trance, hate crime condemnations do little to prevent physical harm against trans people, he said, noting that the criminal system is often one of the main culprits of the said damage. 2024 analysis The American Federation of Civic Freedom has found that more than one of four surveyed translations have reported that police have experienced physical force.
“If we really wanted to prevent violence against trans people, we would have fought for increased housing, increased support for revenues, access to health care and basic supplies,” he said.
“The idea of the Hate Crime Act relies on this picture of a stranger for you who, if the police pick them up, will be removed from the streets and then we will all be safer … When it is in reality, it is systemic. It is all over our society.”
If you are affected by this news you can seek support for mental health through resources in your province or territory.
