‘GOOD CHARACTER PRESUMPTION’

Philippines President Pardons U.S. Marine Who Murdered Transgender Woman

The surprise move has outraged LGBTQ advocates and the victim’s family.

A U.S. marine who was sentenced to 10 years in prison in the Philippines for murdering a transgender woman he picked up at a bar has been pardoned by President Rodrigo Duterte and will be freed four years early. Lance Cpl. Joseph Scott Pemberton admitted he choked the life out of 26-year-old Jennifer Laude in a motel room in 2014 after he discovered she was transgender and was convicted of a hate crime. Duterte said he was letting Pemberton out for good behavior behind bars. “We should allow him the good character presumption,” he said, according to The Washington Post. LGBTQ groups and Laude’s family are outraged by the move. “There are too many Filipino convicts, already in their twilight years serving their sentence,” family attorney Virgie Suarez said. “Why give [the pardon] to a foreigner, a U.S. soldier who committed an atrocious crime?”