Gwen Amber Rose Araujo (February 24, 1985 – October 4, 2002) She was murdered by four men, two of whom she had been sexually intimate with, who beat and strangled her after discovering that she was transgender. Two of the defendants were convicted of second-degree murder, Under California law at the time of the murder, the sexual intimacy by Magidson and Merel, both 22 years of age, with Gwen Araujo was statutory rape.
Merel and Magidson were sentenced to life imprisonment with the possibility of parole after 15 years. Merel was granted early parole in 2016, after reportedly showing extensive remorse to Araujo's mother, who supported the decision. Magidson, however, has reportedly never shown remorse and has been denied parole three times since his sentencing.
Victim
Gwen Araujo was born on February 24, 1985, in Brawley, California, to Edward Araujo and Sylvia Guerrero. Her parents divorced when she was 10 months old. She began to grow her hair long and planned to undergo hormone treatment and surgery. Her older sister said that she was bullied in junior high school because of her voice and bearing. She transferred to an alternative high school, but did not return for the 2002–03 academic year. The night they met Araujo, she flirted with all four men and they smoked marijuana together. After she left, Nabors asked the other three, "Could this be a dude?", but none of the four men took the thought seriously. Later, she engaged in oral sex with Magidson and anal sex with Merel.
Nicole Brown, who was dating Paul Merel (José's older brother) and was acquainted with Araujo, said that she and Araujo had engaged in a physical fight after Brown challenged Araujo to strip for the men. Araujo surprised her with a strong blow during the fight, and Brown said the men "were tripping, because she was smaller than me and just as strong. She fought like a guy." The four men debated in late September whether Araujo was female, concluding that "something bad could happen" to her if she was not. attended by them, their younger brother Emmanuel Merel, Michael Magidson, Jaron Nabors, Jason Cazares, and Nicole Brown. Nabors later testified that José Merel said that night, "I swear, if it's a f— man, I'm gonna kill him. If it's a man, she ain't gonna leave." Brown said the four men were out at a club together and did not return to the house until after midnight. Brown was surprised and blurted out, "It's a f— man!", Brown testified that she warned Araujo that the men were "very angry", but upon exiting through the front door, Araujo was confronted and forced back inside the house by Magidson, Nabors, and Cazares. saying "I can't be f— gay." Araujo begged the men to stop, saying "No, please don't. I have a family." The last words Merel heard Araujo speak were "I told you I was sorry." Emmanuel Merel later testified he walked to a convenience store to buy gum, then went to a friend's house to spend the night. saying as they left the Merel house that the other men were going to "kill that b—". Magidson hit her head against the living room wall with his knee, rendering her unconscious. Nabors testified that Magidson's assault was so severe it left a dent in the wall and cracked the plaster. and Cazares testified that he never struck her and did not see her die. Rumors reached her family that a girl who had been outed as transgender at a party had been killed and buried in Tahoe,
Two days after Araujo was reported missing, a friend of Jaron Nabors described him as appearing distraught. On October 24, Nabors pleaded not guilty, Magidson was still looking for an attorney, and José Merel was still reviewing the evidence against him. In an interview with the Los Angeles Times, Merel was confident that charges would be dropped.
After he was arrested, Nabors wrote a letter to a girlfriend in which he stated the defendants had discussed a "Soprano-type plan" to "kill the b— and get rid of her body". The letter was intercepted by sheriff's officials Cazares had been identified as a potential witness on October 22. At the first trial, defense attorney Tony Serra accused Nabors of writing the letter knowing it would be intercepted and implicate Cazares. During the formal entry of his plea, Judge Kenneth Burr warned Nabors that he could still be charged with murder if prosecutors found he was not "living up to your end of the bargain".
During the February 2003 indictment proceedings, Nabors gave a detailed account of the murder and burial. As they were burying her, the men continued to disparage her. Nabors testified that he stated he "couldn't believe that someone would ever do that, would be that deceitful" and that José Merel added "he was so mad he could still kick her a couple more times".
Magidson, Merel, and Cazares
First trial
Before the first trial, the prosecuting attorney, Alameda County deputy district attorney Chris Lamiero argued that simply being transgender should not have been a death sentence:
Jury selection for the trial of Magidson, José Merel, and Cazares began on March 15, 2004. Prospective jurors were asked if they knew any lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender people; whether they knew any recently married same-sex couples; whether they had met any transgender people; or whether they had seen a "movie or theatrical performance depicting the activities of a transgender person". One of the defense attorneys explained the last question had specifically asked if prospective jurors had watched the film Boys Don't Cry or the play The Laramie Project, but was changed over defense concerns that by being so specific, those who had not would be prompted to watch them. In his opening statement, the defense attorney for Magidson argued that he should not be charged with murder, rather manslaughter at worst, under California law. Magidson's attorney said that his client was not biased but had been shocked "beyond reason" to learn he had unwittingly had sex with a "man": a variant of the gay panic defense. During his testimony, Nabors said he felt his friends had been raped, since Araujo (whom he referred to as male) "did not come clean with being what he really was. I feel like he forced them into homosexual sex, and my definition of rape was being forced into sex." When asked how she forced them, Nabors answered, "Through deception."
The first trial ended in a mistrial on June 22 following nine days of deliberations, when the jurors were unable to reach a unanimous decision for the three men. While the jury agreed that Araujo had been murdered, they could not agree whether it was premeditated.
One of the jurors wrote a newspaper article after the mistrial; in it, he credited Cazares's defense attorney, Tony Serra, with introducing enough reasonable doubt about the veracity of the prosecution's witnesses, including both Brown (who had admitted to consuming more than a dozen beers that night) and Nabors (who was characterized as a liar and "chameleon", prone to exaggeration and eager to please in every social situation).
Second trial
The second trial began on May 31, 2005. Publicity by transgender activists was credited with informing the public about the tactics the defense lawyers had adopted to blame Araujo for her own death, changing the approach to the case. The day after the first trial ended in a mistrial, a court granted Araujo's mother's petition for a posthumous name change, requiring the defense lawyers to refer to the victim with female pronouns. Magidson, Merel, and Cazares were charged with first-degree murder with hate-crime enhancements.
During the closing statements of the second trial, Cazares' defense lawyer Tony Serra argued that the three defendants were "ordinary human beings" who were guilty, at most, of manslaughter for their role in the death in a "classic state of heat and passion". Serra also argued that Cazares took no active role in killing her.
On September 8, the jury announced that it had reached verdicts on two of the three defendants. As Judge Harry Sheppard instructed, the verdicts were kept secret.
On September 12, after a week of deliberation, the jury announced its verdicts. It had deadlocked on Cazares, voting 9–3 in favor of convicting him for murder. Magidson and Merel were each convicted on the charge of second-degree murder, but not convicted of the hate-crime enhancement allegations. After the trial, one of the jurors stated in an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle that the murder conviction was because "The community standard is not and cannot be that killing is something a reasonable person would have done that night" but not hate crimes since the murder was believed to have been committed not because Araujo was transgender, but to "cover up a situation that had gotten out of control".
Michael Magidson and José Merel were sentenced in January to 15 years to life in prison, for second-degree murder. While Merel expressed deep sorrow and regret to Araujo's family, Magidson was angry about his verdict and expressed "no remorse" for his role in murdering Araujo, according to presiding Judge Harry Sheppard.
Jason Cazares
To avoid a third trial, Cazares pleaded no contest to manslaughter on December 16, 2005, Attorney Gloria Allred represented Araujo's family. Cazares asked to begin serving his sentence after the birth of his third child, scheduled for March or April 2006, which was granted, According to Lamiero, Cazares was willing to plead guilty to being an accessory after the fact, but that deal was rejected because the sentence was just three years and admitted no culpability in the murder. There were people there that picketed with signs, but friends wore angel wings to block the casket from the signs. She was cremated, and her mother Sylvia Guerrero retained the urn with her ashes.
At the request of Guerrero, a judge posthumously changed the victim's legal name to Gwen Amber Rose Araujo on June 23, 2004. Amber Rose was the name Guerrero had chosen before her child was born, in the event it was a girl. By 2005, Guerrero had spoken to more than 20 schools. The fund was closed sometime before September 2020.
Sylvia Guerrero, Araujo's mother, worked as a legal assistant at a San Jose law firm, but, , was homeless due to PTSD from the incident. Guerrero has been unable to return to work and now moves her belongings from relatives' houses using a borrowed car from her friend. , Guerrero was staying with her son but was still too traumatized to return to work.
Media portrayals
- The song Ballad of Gwen Araujo was released in 2004 by Phil and the Osophers.
- A Lifetime movie titled A Girl Like Me: The Gwen Araujo Story, starring J. D. Pardo and Mercedes Ruehl, first aired in June 2006.
- The case was also the subject of a 2007 documentary, Trained in the Ways of Men. This documentary by Michelle Prevost examines the 2002 murder, and aims to debunk the so-called gay panic (or trans panic) defense.
- "Deadly ID", an episode of Investigation Discovery's Fatal Encounters (season 1 episode 8, first aired May 7, 2012) explored the crime's timeline from both Araujo's and Magidson's dramatized perspectives.
- An episode of the Investigation Discovery's Murder Among Friends titled "Murder Party" (season 2 episode 4) aired on July 6, 2017. The episode examines the case using dramatizations of the background of Araujo, events leading up to her murder and the aftermath. It also examines the backgrounds of the killers and their friends, how they got caught, and interviews with the victim's mother, friends, and the victim's advocates, along with showing actual photos of her and her murderers and explaining how the court trials went.
California legislation
In September 2006, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the "Gwen Araujo Justice for Victims Act" (AB 1160) into law. The law limited the use by criminal defendants of the "gay/trans panic defense" by allowing parties to instruct jurors not to let bias influence their decisions, including "bias against the victim" based on his or her "gender identity, or sexual orientation". The law further restricted the use of the gay/trans panic defense by amending California's manslaughter statute to prohibit defendants from claiming that they were provoked to murder by discovering a victim's sexual orientation or gender identity. AB 2501 was introduced by Assemblywoman Susan A. Bonilla in partnership with Equality California. In announcing the bill's introduction they cited the murder of Araujo and the 2008 murder of gay California teen Larry King.
Michael Magidson said he was not ready for release at his first parole board hearing in 2016, and his request for parole was also opposed by Guerrero.