Clipped without permission from the San Francisco Bay Times dated Oct. 7, 1993 =========================================================== New Hate Crimes Legislation Passes House Washington - The U.S. House passed the Hate Crimes Sentencing Enhancement Act on Sept. 21, increasing the sentence (by three offense levels) for hate-related crimes, including queer bashings. Congress in 1990 passed the Hate Crimes Statistics Act, which mandates the recording of numbers of hate-related crimes in the U.S., in- cluding those against gays/lesbians/bisexuals. The new bill, like its precedessor in 1990, is expected to raise the ire of Senate homophobe Jesse Helms (R-N.C.) because of its inclusion of sexual orien- tation as a protected category.