Photo by Mr. T in DC

Galvanized by recent anti-gay hate crimes, several hundred activists are planning to a rally and march tonight in support of the victims.

More than 600 people so far have signed up for the “Silent March for Victims of GLBT Violence” on the event’s Facebook page.

Marchers are planning to gather at 7 p.m. outside the IHOP restaurant in Columbia Heights where in the early hours of March 11, a gay man was shot in the chest after a verbal argument with another group of diners escalated into violence. The following evening, a gay man exiting a cab at Georgia Avenue an Irving Street NW was severely beaten and robbed of several personal belongings in an incident in which the assailants were motivated by an anti-gay bias, police said last week.

Police said last week that both attacks are being investigated as bias-motivated incidents. The organizers of the rally are also hoping to shed more light on a third incident last week in which a transgender woman in the Trinidad neighborhood was assaulted and knocked unconscious. Though the victim later told investigators she believed she was targeted because she is transgender, police are not investigating her assault as a potential hate crime.

The D.C. Trans Coalition, which is participating in tonight’s rally, has in recent weeks been particularly vocal about what it sees as a lack of attention paid toward crimes targeting transgender victims on the part of the Metropolitan Police Department.

From IHOP, the march will continue on to the intersection of Georgia Avenue and Irving Street before heading downtown toward its endpoint at Cobalt bar and nightclub at 17th and R streets NW. Councilmembers Jim Graham (D-Ward 1) and Michael A. Brown (I-At Large) are both scheduled to take part in the march.