O’Shae Sibley Stabbing Suspect Charged with Murder as a Hate Crime after Dancer Killed Voguing to Beyoncé

The teenager accused of stabbing a New York dancer to death at a gas station was charged with murder as a hate crime, Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez confirmed Thursday evening.

Sibley, a 28-year-old gay professional dancer, was killed at a Brooklyn gas station after an altercation with a group of people who allegedly yelled homophobic slurs.

“We have decided to prosecute this case as a hate crime,” Gonzalez said on Thursday. “O’Shae and his friends were allegedly targeted because they were dancing. They were being themselves, dancing joyfully to Beyoncé music at a Brooklyn gas station. Harming no one and refusing to stop even when confronted with anti-Black and homophobic slurs demanding that they stop dancing.”

A grand jury decided that the 17-year-old high school student who allegedly fatally stabbed Sibley should be indicted with murder as a hate crime, according to local news station PIX-11.

The unidentified suspect in the case turned himself in to police earlier in August, a week after Sibley was killed.

The teen could face a minimum of 20 years in jail if convicted.

“We will announce that the indictment is going to be arraigned tomorrow in the youth court,” Gonzalez added. “Because of his age and because of that, I’m not releasing his name today, but he’ll be arraigned tomorrow in court in Judge Walker’s court and so tomorrow will be the next step in the journey for justice.” 

Sibley's death quickly sparked a national outcry and memorials from people across the country, including Beyoncé herself, who paid tribute to him on her website.

Surveillance video from the scene of the crime captured a confrontation between Sibley and a group of men. The confrontation then escalated when a man wearing red shorts and a black T-shirt took out a knife and stabbed Sibley in the chest.

"They killed him right in front of me," Sibley's friend Otis Pena said, recalling his friend's blood all over his hands. "They murdered him because he was gay, because he stood up for his friends."