The Laramie Project

In the first of medical updates in Act II, at 3pm on Saturday, October 10, 1998, Rulon Stacey makes an announcement to the media. Matthew Shepard was admitted in a critical condition on Wednesday 7th and required breathing support. His major injuries included hypothermia and a skull fracture, which had caused bleeding on the brain. His parents had arrived on Friday and wanted to thank the public for their support and requested privacy at this difficult time.

In “Seeing Matthew,” the Narrator explains that both Aaron and Russell pled not guilty, as did their girlfriends, Kristin and Chastity, who were charged as accessories. On their next trip to Laramie the theatre group spoke with the Chief Investigating Officer, Detective Rob DeBree of Albany County Sheriff’s Office. DeBree told them that hardest thing about the case was “seeing” (54) Matthew; he was used to dealing with dead bodies, not people fighting for their lives. He spends a lot of time on the case as he is determined not to let McKinney and Henderson “get out of this” (55). Aaron Kreifels reveals he keeps seeing the image of Matthew as he found him. It is deeply unpleasant and he is plagued by the question of why God wanted him to find Matthew. Catherine Connolly described herself as irrationally terrified” (55), and won’t let her son outside to play. Matt Galloway is tormented by the possibility that he could have intervened that night and prevented the attack on Matthew. 

Reggie Fluty reveals that, because there was such “an overwhelming amount of blood” (55) at the scene, she eventually ran out of protective gloves and got some blood on her bare hands. She later learns that Matthew is HIV+ and that she has been exposed to the virus because she had open cuts on her hands. She is immediately given medication to try and stop her contracting the disease. Marge, who appeared earlier in the play, tells us that Reggie is her daughter. After learning that her daughter might contract HIV, Marge “wanted to lash out at somebody” (56); she wasn’t angry at Matthew, but at McKinney and Henderson for causing “so much grief for so many people” (56). Reggie and Marge’s voices overlap at the end of this section, explaining the terrible stress this has caused for their family and their conflict over Reggie’s parents’ wish that she quit the police force. Marge just hopes she doesn’t outlive her daughter, as she “couldn’t handle that” (57).

In the next moment, “E-mail,” the President of the University of Wyoming, Philip Dubois describes an e-mail he received accusing him and the other heterosexual residents of Laramie of complicity with the attack on Matthew Shepard and comparing them to those “Germans who looked the other way” (57) during the Holocaust and that “‘you have Matthew’s blood on your hands’” (58). Dubois responds by saying that “you can’t possibly know what this has done to me and my family and my community” (58).

In a very short moment, entitled “Vigils,” the Narrator gives a list of vigils held for Matthew around the country, while TV monitors onstage show images of these events. This is followed by a second “Medical Update,” given on Sunday, October 11 at 9am. Rulon Stacey announces that Matthew remains in a critical condition and repeats the Shepard family’s expression of gratitude for public support and their request for privacy.