On October 6, 1998, Judy's older son Matthew was beaten and pistol whipped in
Laramie, Wyoming. Matthew Shepard died six days later at
Poudre Valley Hospital in
Fort Collins, Colorado, on October 12, 1998, at age 21. It was widely reported by mass media that it was due to him being
gay. The incident became one of the defining cases of hate-crimes and was cited for passing hate-crime legislation. In response, Judy Shepard created the
Matthew Shepard Foundation. The foundation's purpose is to advance "
social justice,
diversity awareness and education, and
equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people". She is the founding president of the Foundation's
Board of Directors, and served as the first
executive director from 1999 to 2009. On March 20, 2007, the
Matthew Shepard Act (), a bill which would expand federal hate-crimes legislation to include sexual orientation, was introduced as federal bipartisan legislation in the
U.S. Congress, sponsored by Democrat
John Conyers with 171 co-sponsors. Judy and her husband Dennis were present at the introduction ceremony. That bill did not pass however, after then-
President George W. Bush threatened to veto the bill if it passed. As of 2009, she is still board president of the foundation, and as a result she travels across the United States speaking to different audiences. In 2009, she published a memoir,
The Meaning of Matthew about how her family dealt with his murder, the subsequent court cases, the media coverage, and their work to advance
civil rights over the last decade. There was a controversy when the act was being debated in the
House of Representatives, and while Judy Shepard was in the audience, Representative
Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., called the allegation that the murder of Matthew Shepard was because of his homosexuality a
hoax; later she apologized for this statement. On October 11, 2009, she addressed a rally for LGBTQ rights in the
United States Capitol, at the
National Equality March, saying "I'm here today because I lost my son to hate.... No one has the right to tell my son whether or not he can work anywhere. Whether or not he can live wherever he wants to live and whether or not he can be with the one person he loves—no one has that right. We are all Americans. We are all equal Americans, gay, straight or whatever" On the Saturday night before, President Obama addressed the
Human Rights Campaign in the Capitol and mentioned his promise to Judy Shepard in the
Oval Office, in his reassertion of his commitment to pass legislation important to the LGBTQ community. On October 22, 2009, the
United States Congress passed the
Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, and on October 28, 2009, President Obama signed the legislation into law. Judy and her husband Dennis announced
Wyoming's votes in the roll call at the
2020 Democratic National Convention. ==Awards and honors==