Matthew Shepard
American LGBT student and murder victim
Matthew Wayne Shepard (December 1, 1976 – October 12, 1998) was an American student at the University of Wyoming who was beaten, tortured, and left to die near Laramie on October 6, 1998. He was transported by rescuers to Poudre Valley Hospital in Fort Collins, Colorado, where he died six days later from severe head injuries sustained during the attack.
Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson were arrested shortly after the attack and charged with first-degree murder following Shepard's death. Henderson pleaded guilty to murder, and McKinney was tried and found guilty of murder; each of them received two consecutive life sentences.
Significant media coverage was given to the murder and what role Shepard's sexual orientation played as a motive for the crime, as he was gay. The prosecutor argued the murder of Shepard was premeditated and driven by greed. McKinney's defense counsel countered by arguing that he had intended only to rob Shepard but he killed him in a rage when Shepard made a sexual advance toward him. In a 2009 interview, McKinney said, "The night I did it, I did have hatred for homosexuals" and "he was obviously gay. That played a part. His weakness.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Matthew Shepard” is american LGBT student and murder victim. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Matthew, Shepard and American, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “american LGBT student and murder victim” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 20, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q313244. VIAF identifies the subject as 43628680. The Library of Congress control number is n99014979. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1976, 1998 and 2009.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Matthew Shepard”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Matthew Shepard primary sources, Matthew Shepard archive and Matthew research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Matthew Shepard”?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Matthew Shepard” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.