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Winchell lawsuit

WASHINGTON – A woman whose son was murdered becaue he was perceived to be gay is suing the Army.

Patricia Kutteles of Kansas City, Mo., filed suit against the Army for $1.8 million for the death of her son, Pfc. Barry Winchell, 21.

She said fellow soldiers believed Winchell was gay and harassed him for months before he was beaten to death while sleeping in his cot last July at Fort Campbell, Ky. The Army knew about the harassment but did nothing to stop it, she said.

“We want the Army to be held accountable,” Kutteles said.

Pvt. Calvin Glover, 19, of Sulphur, Okla., was convicted of premeditated murder and sentenced to life in prison for the attack on Winchell. Another soldier was given a 12-1/2-year sentence for lying to investigators and obstructing justice.

Utah club can meet

SALT LAKE CITY – A student club focusing on gay and lesbian issues will be able to meet after all.

A federal judge says PRISM, or People Respecting Important Social Movements, should not be shut down while a lawsuit against the city school district is pending.

PRISM sued, arguing the school district unfairly denied the East High School students permission to meet.

U.S. District Judge Tena Campbell suggested that school officials violated their own policy and the Constitution in snubbing PRISM.

In 1996, the school district eliminated all nonacademic clubs rather than allow a gay club at East High, a move that was upheld in federal court.

In response, Jessica Cohen and Maggie Hinckley applied in February to set up PRISM as an academic club. The club’s goal is to discuss history through gay and lesbian issues, and their application said the club would “expand and enhance our study and understanding of American history and government.”

Anti-discrimination laws

WASHINGTON – Anti-discrimination laws don’t result in greater numbers of lawsuits.

That’s the word from a report that went to the U.S. Senate.

“I think the facts are clear, there has been no litigation explosion as a result of laws preventing employment discrimination based on sexual orientation,” said Sen. Jim Jeffords, R-Vt.

A General Accounting Office study requested by Jeffords found that in the 11 states and the District of Columbia that have sexual orientation anti-discrimination laws, there was “no indication that these laws have generated a significant amount of litigation.”

The study by GAO, the investigative wing of Congress, also revealed that sexual discrimination cases are a relatively small proportion of all employment discrimination complaints.

Jeffords and Sens. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., and Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., are sponsoring a bill that would give federal protections against sexual orientation discrimination.

Girls at prom

FLOYD, Va. – A high school girl braved criticism and complaints last month and went to her prom – with a girl on her arm.

Scores of parents and other community members turned out at recent school board meetings to oppose Tiffany Lapine’s plan to attend the Floyd County High School junior prom with another girl.

The American Civil Liberties Union took Tiffany’s side and told school officials that barring her from taking a female date would be illegal.

School officials ultimately decided that Tiffany could attend the prom with her date, who is not a student at Floyd County High.

March on Washington

WASHINGTON – At least 200,000 people – perhaps as many as 1 million – turned out for the Millennium March on Washington for Equality.

Authorities said they estimated the crowd that marched up the National Mall and gathered a couple of blocks from the Capitol at around 200,000.

In a crowd dotted with openly gay celebrities, the marchers celebrated what had been a week of victories that included passage of a new law in Vermont giving gays marriage-like rights and a renewed plea by President Clinton for a federal Hate Crimes Prevention Act.

But participants vowed not to rest until same-sex couples get equal rights in all 50 states, and some wore costumes or carried signs calling attention to fights still on the horizon.

Clinton spoke via videotape to what was the first gay rights march on Washington since 1993. His image shown on a giant screen, the president declared he had presided over “the most inclusive administration in history,” that has appointed more than 150 openly gay people to important government posts.

AIDS & national security

WASHINGTON – The Clinton administration has declared AIDS a potential threat to national security.

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said that with millions of people succumbing to the disease “AIDS is a national security issue.”

She said the administration was asking for another $100 million next year for prevention education programs and “it is very important for all those in leadership positions to understand what the new threats to our societies are in the 21st century.”

Albright said Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott was “stuck in the past” in not recognizing AIDS as a threat to national security.

“It is very important for people to understand what are the threats to national security,” Albright said at a news conference.

Lott, a Mississippi Republican, said the administration’s declaration that the disease was a threat “is just the president trying to make an appeal to, you know, certain groups.”

“I don’t view (AIDS) as a national security threat, not to our national security interests, no,” Lott said.

No Mississippi adoption

JACKSON, Miss. – Mississippi has become the third state in the nation to ban adoption by same-sex couples.

Democratic Gov. Ronnie Musgrove signed the bill after it easily cleared the Legislature in the final days of the recently concluded 2000 session. Florida and Utah have similar laws.

The American Civil Liberties Union has vowed to file a lawsuit on behalf of an unidentified gay couple planning an adoption in Mississippi. The ACLU is already fighting Florida’s law in court.

Mississippi’s law takes effect July 1. Its supporters said it was spurred in part by Vermont’s new law giving gay couples nearly all of the benefits of marriage.

“We need to put up a firewall and say, ‘This is not going to happen here,’ Mike Crook, state director for the Tupelo-based American Family Association, said Wednesday. “They can go to court all day long, and I think we’ll prevail.”

Opponents said there was no reason for the state to get involved in the issue.

“It’s a part of the get ‘em mentality. They have to be getting somebody,” said Democratic state Rep. Jim Evans.

Craig dies

LOS ANGELES – A publisher and pioneer in establishing cityhood for West Hollywood has died.

Robert F. Craig was an activist who pushed AIDS education, fought for West Hollywood’s cityhood, and founded the gay newsmagazine Frontiers. He was 65.

Craig co-founded Frontiers in 1982 and eventually became the sole owner, turning the 16-page tabloid into a magazine with a current circulation of 86,000.

Early on, Frontiers publicized the new threat of AIDS, to the discomfort of gay bars and bathhouses, who vowed a boycott.

In the 1970s, he co-founded a group for gay and lesbian business owners that is now called the Los Angeles Business Alliance.

In 1984, he was elected chairman of the West Hollywood Incorporation Committee.

Missing March money

WASHINGTON – The FBI is investigating what happened to some money associated with the Millennium March on Washington.

Federal agents are looking into reports that approximately $750,000 is missing from the march.

Organizers of the march said they have not received the funds from the company that produced the festival related to the event.

“We haven’t determined the sum of money that’s missing, who might have been involved and what happened to the money that’s allegedly missing,” said Susan Lloyd, an FBI spokeswoman.

Agents have launched a preliminary inquiry into the allegation and eventually will consult with an assistant U.S. attorney to determine whether a full investigation is warranted, Lloyd said.

Canadians scold Laura

OTTAWA – Canadians say they won’t put up with Dr. Laura’s hate.

A Canadian regulatory group has chided radio talk show host Dr. Laura Schlessinger for “abusively discriminatory” comments about gays and lesbians on her show.

The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council said Schlessinger, known as Dr. Laura, violated the human rights provision of the Canadian Association of Broadcasters’ code of ethics.

The decision means Canadian networks that broadcast the syndicated show must make a public announcement about the council ruling during prime-time hours. Her program is believed to reach almost 1 million Canadians. There is no further penalty on the show.

Known for her socially conservative opinions and combative style, she offers advice to listeners on relationships and other matters. Gay rights groups have protested the program in the United States, including a rally in March outside the Paramount Pictures lot in Los Angeles against the studio’s plans for a television talk show hosted by Schlessinger.

The Canadian council cited Dr. Laura for characterizing the sexual behavior of gays and lesbians as “abnormal,” “aberrant,” “deviant,” “disordered,” “dysfunctional,” and “an error.”

“To use such brutal language as she does about such an essential characteristic flies in the face of Canadian provisions relating to human rights,” the council decision said.

Conversion debate scrapped

CHICAGO – The American Psychiatric Association pulled the plug on a discussion of reorientation therapy at its convention after two scheduled panel members decided the issue was “too politically charged” for them to participate.

Exodus International, a Christian organization dedicated to helping gays and lesbians alter their sexual orientations through therapy, protested the cancellation. Board chair John Paulk of Colorado Springs told reporters he represented a “virtually unseen but sizable population” whose existence the APA denies.

The organizer of the debate, Dr. Robert Spitzer, said he was “distressed” by the cancellation, citing a lack of study and convincing evidence on either side of the debate.

“There is only anecdotal evidence, mostly from the therapists themselves, claiming that what they do works. That’s not very scientific.”

Spitzer was at the head of the movement that saw the APA remove homosexuality from its official list of mental disorders in 1973.

Gay midshipman

ANNAPOLIS, Md. – A Navy review panel says it wasn’t fair, but a former midshipman at the Naval Academy still has been ordered to repay the government for his education because of his sexuality.

The academy began investigating Tommie Lee Watkins, Jr., in 1997 following alleged homosexual behavior, which is banned in the military.

Watkins, president of his class and an aspiring Navy pilot, said he was pressured to resign and did so because he feared homophobia would prevent him from receiving a fair trial.

Carolyn H. Becraft, assistant secretary of the Navy for manpower, ordered Watkins in March to repay the government nearly $67,000.

But a report issued in November by the Navy’s highest personnel review panel, made public by The Washington Post, said making Watkins reimburse the government violates Pentagon policy.

A 1994 policy says those discharged for being gay should only be required to repay the government under certain circumstances that require a specific written finding of homosexual misconduct.

“There was no finding of any aggravated homosexual behavior,” the Board for Correction of Naval Records said in its report.

‘50s activist dies

LOS ANGELES – A gay activist who worked for equality starting in the early 1950s died of respiratory failure on May 11. William Dale Jennings was 82.

Jennings was best known as co-founder of the Mattachine Society, the first major American gay rights organization that broke ground in the gay liberation movement before Stonewall.

Jennings was also a co-founder of ONE magazine, the first gay publication in the United States, and the author of novels including The Ronin and The Cowboys, the latter of which was adapted into a motion picture starring John Wayne.

Trying in TO

TORONTO, ON – Vermonters may recognize the pattern: couple approaches clerk; couple requests marriage license; couple rejected because they’re gay. But that’s where the familiar ground ends.

On May 19, the city of Toronto took the unusually proactive step of asking a provincial court how to handle the situation when Michael Leshner and Michael Stark asked for their rejection in writing.

Paul Jones, the city’s director of legal services, said that the law is no longer clear on the issue, given the Supreme Court of Canada ruling last year in M. v. H. that said gay and lesbian couples should receive the same benefits as common-law heterosexual couples.

“We need to know that the law specifically says today,” said Jones. “We’ve neither rejected nor approved the application. We’ve simply said we don’t know anymore.”

Further muddying the waters is the fact that Ontario law does not define marriage as heterosexual or homosexual, although pending federal legislation that offers gay and lesbian couples many marital benefits without marital status does include a definition of marriage as “one man, one woman.”

Leshner and Stark applied for the license in order to join a test marriage lawsuit currently in the works. The two men were previously involved in a landmark 1992 case that established Stark’s claim to Leshner’s survivor pension benefits.

Gielgud dead

LONDON – Legendary British actor Sir John Gielgud died on May 21 at the age of 96.

Although a distinguished Shakespearean actor credited with the definitive portrayal of Hamlet, Gielgud was perhaps most widely known for his Oscar-winning role as Dudley Moore’s sarcastic butler in Arthur.

Gielgud lived for more than two decades with longtime partner Martin Hensler. Although he preferred privacy to gay rights activism, he was open about his homosexuality and was once denied entry to the United States on that basis.

The actor and director, whose career spanned eight decades, worked almost up until the time of his death. His last project was a film adaptation of Samuel Beckett’s Catastrophe.