Voter ‘animus’ to be issue in Calif marriage case
When the U.S. Supreme Court overturned an amendment to the Colorado Constitution that outlawed discrimination protections for gay people, same-sex couples could not enter into civil unions or domestic partnerships anywhere in the nation, much less get married. But as they seek to persuade a federal judge to strike down California’s ban on gay marriages, lawyers for two unmarried gay couples are using that 13-year-old decision as their road map — one they expect will eventually lead the high court to take up the marriage issue. In the Colorado case, Romer v. Evans, the Supreme Court majority held that voters’ dislike of gays and the laws that several cities had approved to shield them from bias motivated the state amendment. Such “animus,” it said, was incompatible with the section of the U.S. Constitution that requires the government to treat its citizens equally absent a compelling reason to do otherwise. The attorneys behind the challenge to California’s Proposition 8 plan to argue during a pretrial hearing Thursday that by stripping gays of the right to wed, the voter-approved ban runs afoul of America’s founding framework in the same way — and for the same reason. “Romer is a strikingly similar situation to what we have here. You had a ballot initiative, a majority vote of the people, taking away a right,” said Theodore J. Boutrous Jr., a member of the legal team led by former U.S. Solicitor General Theodore Olson and veteran trial lawyer David Boies. “And there was no justification or rationale other than disapproval by that majority of that group.” U.S. District Chief Judge Vaughn R. Walker on Tuesday issued a tentative order to fast-track the case in his San Francisco court. Among the questions he said he wants covered at trial are whether sexual orientation is unchangeable, if permitting same-sex marriage “destabilizes” traditional unions and whether Proposition 8’s ballot history demonstrates the measure had “discriminatory intent.” California Attorney General Jerry Brown, a defendant in the case, has sided with gay rights advocates and declined to defend the ban, which overturned a California Supreme Court ruling that had legalized same-sex marriages. The state Supreme Court five weeks ago upheld the measure, saying it represented a valid exercise of voters’ authority to amend the California Constitution. Proposition 8’s sponsors, a coalition of religious conservative groups called Protect Marriage, has been given permission to intervene in the federal case. In court papers, the group’s lawyers rejected the assertions that anti-gay attitudes fueled the November measure and that the 1996 Colorado case was applicable. “Nothing in California law, either Proposition 8 or otherwise, indicates that Californians harbor animus towards gay and lesbian individuals,” they wrote. Since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision, attorneys for gay rights and Christian conservative groups have debated whether the Romer decision could be used to expand gay rights. The ruling marked the first time the Supreme Court determined that the Constitution’s equal rights guarantees extended to gays and lesbians. “The basic point of Romer is that government cannot ever act out of hostility toward a group of people, and whether that is in the context of marriage or anti-discrimination law, the point carries over,” said Suzanne Goldberg, who worked on the case and now directs Columbia Law School’s Sexuality and Gender Law Program. The ruling has been cited, though so far unsuccessfully, in past challenges to gay marriage bans in Nebraska and Florida. At the same time, gay rights groups mostly have shied away from pursuing federal marriage cases in favor of pursuing marriage rights in state courts. Legal observers on both sides of the debate agree, however, that California’s Proposition 8 presents novel questions that could make the issue ripe for federal action.
San Francisco Chronicle
* Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual
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Wisconsin Trial Court Dismisses ACLU Lawsuit Seeking Domestic Partner Benefits For Lesbian and Gay State Employees
The Court’s opinion states: “The plaintiffs have offered a strong showing that the employment benefits in issue have been provided on a discriminatory basis. The defendants’ explanations offered for the continuing discrimination against these plaintiffs are unpersuasive and inadequate.”
“Losing doesn’t get any better than this,” said Larry Dupuis, Litigation Director of the ACLU. “We knew we had an uphill battle in the trial court because of the earlier case. But the court agreed with us that discrimination based on sexual orientation should be subject to strict judicial review and that it is unconstitutional for the state to deny equal benefits.”
The Court also found that providing the benefits would not be barred by the anti-gay marriage amendment that passed in 2006. After the amendment passed, the state had argued that the amendment barred the state from providing the benefits.
The ACLU filed the lawsuit in April 2005 on behalf of six lesbian state employees and their partners. The lawsuit charges that it is a violation of the state’s equal protection guarantees to deny lesbian and gay state employees access to the same health insurance and family leave protections that it provides to straight employees who are able to cover their spouses. The lawsuit was stalled for years because a number of Wisconsin municipalities tried to inject themselves into the lawsuit. The issue ultimately went up to the Wisconsin Supreme Court, which ruled that they were not entitled to become a party to the litigation.
“While we are heartened by the court’s decision, we urge the legislature to pass the domestic partner bill so there will be no need to appeal,” added Chris Ahmuty, Executive Director of the ACLU of Wisconsin. “Our clients are forced to pay expensive prices for inferior health coverage and sometimes even to forego necessary care. They suffer every day this issue goes unresolved.”
Wisconsin Department of Corrections employee Jayne Dunnum and her partner, Robin Timm, pay nearly $450 a month for private insurance for Timm who works on the couple’s organic farm and food store in Platteville. “We don’t care if it happens through the courts or the legislature. We just really need the health insurance coverage,” said Dunnum. “It’s a matter of basic fairness. I work just as hard has my straight colleagues and shouldn’t be denied the equal employment benefits.”
The case is Dunnum v. Department of Employee Trust Funds. The couples are represented by John Knight and Rose Saxe of the ACLU’s Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Project, Larry Dupuis of the ACLU of Wisconsin, and cooperating attorneys Linda Roberson and Christopher Krimmer of the Madison law firm Balisle & Roberson.
Biographical information for all of the couples, today’s decision, the complaint, and additional information are available at http://www.aclu.org/getequal/caseprofiles.htm.
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Verdicts upheld in murder of transgender teen
NEWARK — A state appeals court upheld the murder convictions of two East Bay men today for their roles in battering and strangling a transgender teenager after learning she was biologically male.
The killing of 17-year-old Gwen Araujo of Newark in 2002 drew national attention to incidents of violence against transgender people, which often include defense claims that the victim provoked the attack by having sex under false pretenses.
In this case, lawyers for both defendants argued that the slaying was manslaughter at most, because their clients had acted in the heat of passion when they learned the person with whom they had had oral and anal sex was born male. But the First District Court of Appeal in San Francisco ruled 3-0 that the Alameda County trial judge had defined the crimes properly to the jury, and that the panel had substantial evidence for second-degree murder convictions.
Mark Greenberg, a lawyer for defendant Michael Magidson, said he would appeal to the state Supreme Court.
See Verdicts upheld in murder of transgender teen
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Missing e-mails at issue in Wone murder
Attorneys representing three gay men charged with obstruction of justice in connection with the murder of Washington attorney Robert Wone accused prosecutors in court Friday of failing to preserve evidence from Wone’s BlackBerry cell phone that could have helped prove their clients’ innocence.
The lead prosecutor in the case, Assistant U.S. Attorney Glenn Kirschner, disputed the significance of the lost e-mails. He said the government has solid evidence showing that defendants Joseph Price, Victor Zaborsky and Dylan Ward obstructed justice by engaging in evidence tampering to hide the facts surrounding Wone’s August 2006 murder.
But Bernard Grimm, Price’s attorney, told reporters after Friday’s status hearing before D.C. Superior Court Judge Frederic Weisberg that the government theory about the timing of the murder is “now under question.” He said the questions surfaced as a result of the government’s disclosure April 17 that Wone sent at least two e-mails from his BlackBerry at a time when prosecutors believed Wone dead. See Missing e-mails at issue in Wone murder * Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual
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King murder hearing delayed by death of defendant’s dad
(Oxnard, California) The preliminary hearing for Brandon McInerney, the 15-year old accused of killing gay classmate Lawrence King, has been put on hold following the sudden death of McInerney’s father.
The preliminary hearing, to determine if there was enough evidence to bind the teen over for trial, was to have begun …
Tags: Classmate, Dad, Defendant, gay, King Murder, Lawrence King, Mcinerney, Oxnard California, Preliminary Hearing, Sudden DeathLambda Legal and ARCW File Federal Lawsuit on Behalf of HIV Positive Woman Denied Surgery by Healthcare Provider
(Milwaukee, WI, February 12, 2009) — Lambda Legal and the AIDS Resource Center of Wisconsin (ARCW) filed a federal lawsuit today in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin on behalf of Melody Rose, a 35-year-old Wisconsin woman who was denied surgery to remove her gallbladder because she has HIV.
“Discrimination in healthcare remains a major problem for people living with HIV,” said Peter Kimball, Director of the Legal Services Program at the AIDS Resource Center of Wisconsin (ARCW). “In violation of both federal and Wisconsin law, Dr. Steven Cahee refused to provide needed medical treatment to our client, Melody Rose.”
Lambda Legal and ARCW represent Melody Rose who experienced health problems with her gallbladder while incarcerated at Taycheedah Correctional Institution in Fond du Lac. Ultimately, her physician referred her to Dr. Steven Cahee at the Fond du Lac Regional Hospital to have her gall bladder removed.
However, Dr. Cahee refused to perform the surgery after learning Ms. Rose is HIV-positive. Some time thereafter, a surgeon at a different medical facility removed Ms. Rose’s gallbladder in a laprascopic procedure, which is considered routine surgery.
“Dr. Cahee’s actions fly in the face of ethical behavior for a medical professional,” said Scott Schoettes, Staff Attorney with Lambda Legal’s HIV Project. “Long ago, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention established that using universal precautions — which are required in all sorts of medical situations, including surgeries — makes it extremely unlikely for the virus to be transmitted in this setting.”
The complaint filed today alleges that the defendants –- Steven M. Cahee, M.D., Agnesian HealthCare, Inc., and Fond du Lac Regional Clinic, S.C., violated four different state and federal laws. The complaint alleges that the defendants violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and its state law counterpart, which both prohibit disability discrimination by places of public accommodation (including healthcare providers); the Rehabilitation Act, which requires recipients of federal financial assistance not to discriminate against people with disabilities; and a Wisconsin law addressing HIV discrimination specifically, which forbids healthcare providers from denying services to people (or humiliating and degrading them) based solely on their HIV status.
The case is Rose v. Cahee, et al.
Scott Schoettes, HIV Project Staff Attorney, is handling the case for Lambda Legal. He is joined by co-counsel Peter Kimball, of AIDS Resource Center of Wisconsin.
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Details in gay student’s slaying are revealed in court documents
Lawrence “Larry” King wasn’t sexually harassing fellow eighth-grade student Brandon McInerney in the weeks leading up to King’s shooting death, prosecutors contend in court documents.
McInerney was the aggressor, teasing the effeminate King for weeks and vowing to “get a gun and shoot” him, according to a prosecution brief. Multiple students provided accounts of a growing hostility between the two boys, the document shows.
Their dispute ended in tragedy a year ago today when McInerney allegedly armed himself with a .22-caliber revolver and shot King in the back of the head twice in an Oxnard classroom as the school day was beginning.
“In the days before the shooting, the defendant tried to enlist others to administer a beating to Larry,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Maeve Fox wrote in a “statement of facts” filed with the brief. “When that failed for lack of interest, he decided to kill Larry.”
Prosecutors said they provided their most detailed account to date of the events leading to the classroom killing to counter the defense’s argument that murder charges against McInerney, then 14, were improperly filed in adult court.
See Details in gay student’s slaying are revealed in court documents
Los Angeles Times, CA -
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Lambda Legal and ARCW File Federal Lawsuit on Behalf of HIV Positive Woman Denied Surgery by Healthcare Provider
(Milwaukee, WI, February 12, 2009) — Lambda Legal and the AIDS Resource Center of Wisconsin (ARCW) filed a federal lawsuit today in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin on behalf of Melody Rose, a 35-year-old Wisconsin woman who was denied surgery to remove her gallbladder because she has HIV.
“Discrimination in healthcare remains a major problem for people living with HIV,” said Peter Kimball, Director of the Legal Services Program at the AIDS Resource Center of Wisconsin (ARCW). “In violation of both federal and Wisconsin law, Dr. Steven Cahee refused to provide needed medical treatment to our client, Melody Rose.”
Lambda Legal and ARCW represent Melody Rose who experienced health problems with her gallbladder while incarcerated at Taycheedah Correctional Institution in Fond du Lac. Ultimately, her physician referred her to Dr. Steven Cahee at the Fond du Lac Regional Hospital to have her gall bladder removed.
However, Dr. Cahee refused to perform the surgery after learning Ms. Rose is HIV-positive. Some time thereafter, a surgeon at a different medical facility removed Ms. Rose’s gallbladder in a laprascopic procedure, which is considered routine surgery.
“Dr. Cahee’s actions fly in the face of ethical behavior for a medical professional,” said Scott Schoettes, Staff Attorney with Lambda Legal’s HIV Project. “Long ago, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention established that using universal precautions — which are required in all sorts of medical situations, including surgeries — makes it extremely unlikely for the virus to be transmitted in this setting.”
The complaint filed today alleges that the defendants –- Steven M. Cahee, M.D., Agnesian HealthCare, Inc., and Fond du Lac Regional Clinic, S.C., violated four different state and federal laws. The complaint alleges that the defendants violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and its state law counterpart, which both prohibit disability discrimination by places of public accommodation (including healthcare providers); the Rehabilitation Act, which requires recipients of federal financial assistance not to discriminate against people with disabilities; and a Wisconsin law addressing HIV discrimination specifically, which forbids healthcare providers from denying services to people (or humiliating and degrading them) based solely on their HIV status.
The case is Rose v. Cahee, et al.
Scott Schoettes, HIV Project Staff Attorney, is handling the case for Lambda Legal. He is joined by co-counsel Peter Kimball, of AIDS Resource Center of Wisconsin.
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Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/02/lambda-legal-…
Details in gay student’s slaying are revealed in court documents
Lawrence “Larry” King wasn’t sexually harassing fellow eighth-grade student Brandon McInerney in the weeks leading up to King’s shooting death, prosecutors contend in court documents.
McInerney was the aggressor, teasing the effeminate King for weeks and vowing to “get a gun and shoot” him, according to a prosecution brief. Multiple students provided accounts of a growing hostility between the two boys, the document shows.
Their dispute ended in tragedy a year ago today when McInerney allegedly armed himself with a .22-caliber revolver and shot King in the back of the head twice in an Oxnard classroom as the school day was beginning.
“In the days before the shooting, the defendant tried to enlist others to administer a beating to Larry,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Maeve Fox wrote in a “statement of facts” filed with the brief. “When that failed for lack of interest, he decided to kill Larry.”
Prosecutors said they provided their most detailed account to date of the events leading to the classroom killing to counter the defense’s argument that murder charges against McInerney, then 14, were improperly filed in adult court.
See Details in gay student’s slaying are revealed in court documents
Los Angeles Times, CA -
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Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/02/details-in-ga…
Fury Over Obama’s Gay-Affirming Justice Picks
Social conservatives are calling on Congress to reject several of President Obama’s picks to the Department of Justice, including the No. 2 position of deputy attorney general, because they support gay and lesbian equality and the right of a woman to have an abortion.
Republicans on Capital Hill grilled David Ogden, nominated to be the deputy attorney general, at length about those issues at his Thursday confirmation hearing, reports The Associated Press.
Ogden filed a brief in support of the gay defendants at the center of the 2004 Supreme Court case Lawrence v. Texas which declared sodomy laws unconstitutional. Ogden has also defended organizations that support the right of a woman to seek an abortion.
“You’ve taken some very extraordinary positions, some left-leaning and unorthodox positions,” Senator Jon Kyl, a Republican from Arizona, told Ogden.
Evangelical groups, including the ardently anti-gay Focus on the Family and the American Family Association, have objected to Ogden’s nomination.
Similar concerns are being expressed over the nomination of Elena Kagan to Solicitor General. Kagan, who is openly gay, is being denounced for her support of open service for gay military personnel.
See Fury Over Obama’s Gay-Affirming Justice Picks
On Top Magazine, OH
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