Two Spirits: Salt Lake To Screen Documentary on Life and Tragic Death of Transgender Teen

On June 16th,2001 16-year-old Fred Martinez was was attacked and beaten to death in Cortez, Colorado. His attacker, 18-year old Shaun Murphy,  would later brag to his friends that he had,”beat up a fag.”

Martinez’s decomposed body was found June 21, five days after his disappearance, in a desert canyon on the edge of Cortez, known as “The Pits”.

Martinez’s incredible life  story as a Navajo nádleehí, a male-bodied person with a feminine nature, has been captured on film by Director Lydia Nibley.

On the website for Two Spirits, the film’s producers write,”Fred became one of the youngest hate-crime victims in modern history when he was brutally murdered at sixteen. Between tradition and controversy, sex and spirit, and freedom and fear, lives the truth—the bravest choice you can make is to be yourself.”

The heart breaking film which was shown earlier this on most PBS stations through out the county as part of the “Independent Lens” series, has won numerous awards and is being shown in communities and churches across the country.

Folks in the Salt Lake and Logan areas will be able to see the film tonight, Tuesday, November 8th at the  at the City Library auditorium, 210 E. 400 South, Salt Lake City, and at the Taggart Student Center, Utah State University, Logan.

The free Screenings are presented by the Utah Film Center. Nibley will be on hand at both events to answer questions and to share her thoughts on the film.

For those of us who can’t make it to the screenings, if you haven’t seen the film it’s worth tracking down a copy. You can order it from the producers website HERE.