A senator is pushing for heavier penalties for hate crimes against the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community after the brutal killing of a Filipino transgender in Olongapo City recently.

“Hate crimes against the LGBT sector and other minority groups have no place in a civilized society. We should impose heavier penalties so that these discriminatory and inhumane acts will be eradicated,” said Senator Bam Aquino.

Aquino believes the killing of transgender Jeffrey Laude in Olongapo City is not an isolated case because the number of hate crimes against LGBT in the country have risen in the past years.

Aquino cited a data from the Philippine LGBT Hate Crime Watch, indicating that there were 164 cases of murdered LGBTs in the country from 1996 to June 2012.

In the first half of 2011 alone, a study funded by the UN Development Program and the US Agency for International Development showed that 28 killings involving the LGBT community.

“This number will continue to rise unless we do something about it immediately,” stressed Aquino, author of Senate Bill No. 2122 or the Anti-Discrimination Act of 2014, which seeks to combat discrimination of any form.

Aquino’s bill seeks to prohibit and penalize discrimination on the basis of ethnicity, race, religion or belief, gender, sexual orientation, civil status, HIV status and other medical condition, among others.

In the United States, the first hate crime laws were passed after the American Civil War, beginning with the Civil Rights Act of 1871, to combat the growing number of racially motivated crimes.

In 1978, California passed the first state hate-crime statute in connection with four ‘protected status’ categories: race, religion, color, and national origin.

In 2009, President Barack Obama signed the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, which expands the existing United States federal hate crime law to gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or disability.

Other countries also enacted hate-crime laws, including Canada, France, Germany, Greece, Spain and the United Kingdom.