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From InYourFace on-line news. For prior press releases, check the GenderPAC website at
http://www.gpac.org
[Austin, TX: 20 Jan 99] Fifty marchers, carrying a banner with photos of Donald Fuller framed with rainbow streamers, paraded down Congress Avenue Monday (18 Jan) to pay tribute to the slain teenager and to express their conviction that he did not die in vain. Donald Fuller, 18, was murdered on Friday (8 Jan). His body was found dressed as a woman. Family and friends say that he often cross-dressed, using the name Lauryn Paige, and frequented the area of South Congress Avenue. Camaliel Coria, 28, was arrested on Wednesday (13 Jan) and charged with the murder. The march was organized by the Lesbian Gay Rights Lobby of Texas and Out Youth Austin as a memorial to Fuller as well as to show support for anti-discrimination bills filed with the state legislature. InYourFace included this contact in their release: Leah Quin, Austin American-Statesman, lquin@statesman.com. |
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From InYourFace on-line news. For prior press releases, check the GenderPAC website at
http://www.gpac.org
[New York, New York: 20 Jan 99] The family of Bronx transexual woman JaLea Lamont, 27, charge that police officers attacked them in their apartment when the officers responded to a 911 call. LGNY News reports that JaLea's mother, Nancy Lamont, called 911 on 24 Nov 98 when she had trouble reviving JaLea after JaLea had taken some allergy medication. JaLea woke up before paramedics arrived and left the apartment because she didn't want to go to the hospital. The paramedics departed without treating JaLea. Two police officers then arrived and began a search for a potential suicide. When told that JaLea, who had returned, was a transexual, the officers allegedly ridiculed her as a "he-she" and a "transtesticle", pinned her to the floor, and handcuffed her. In attempting to pull the officers off JaLea, Nancy Lamont and her son, John Baez, were sprayed with pepper gas and arrested. JaLea was taken, handcuffed, by ambulance to a local hospital and kept overnight in a psychiatric unit. Representing the family, attorney Mike Spiegel has asked Bronx DA Robert Johnson to drop all charges against those arrested and investigate the alleged misconduct by the police officers. For more info, see this article from The Village Voice: http://www.villagevoice.com:80/features/9903/houppert.shtml |
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From GAIN, http://www.gender.org/gain/.
In a January 20, 1999 story in the Roanoke Times by Michael Hemphill, a prisoner has filed suit against the Roanoke City Jail Sheriff. The 23-year-old plaintiff, Jay McCulley is a transsexual who has been on hormones for several years, and in 1995 became castrated surgically. However, since his inprisonment in June, 1998 for attempted malicious wounding, McCulley has been denied hormones. In his suit, McCulley describes the witholding of hormones as "cruel and unusual punishment," and says his sex transformation is "being painfully, yet unjustifiably, reversed." According to the article, Sheriff George McMillan, McCulley is witholding hormones because McCulley's attempts to become a woman are not a necessity. McMillan also argues that witholding the hormones doesn't endanger McCulley's life or cause serious injury. "If they [inmates] are denied their hormones and if it causes them extreme grief and despair, then they are not being rehabilitated in jail and will emerge distraught and have a much more difficult time readjusting," says Mary Boenke, McCulley's friend and a retired psychoanalyst. Boenke asserts that what's at stake is McCulley's mental rather than physical health. Beginning a sexual transformation and then having it halted is "like coming home from a Halloween party without being able to take off your mask," Boenke said. "People are able to see only your mask, and not what's beneath the mask." |
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From GAIN, http://www.gender.org/gain/.
According to the complaint, which was filed last week in Hennepin County District Court, the plaintiff, referred to as only "John Doe," says that the plaintiff, a transgender man, "has not been allowed to use shower or bathroom facilities for men, nor has the department created unisex facilities for him to use." Once, the plaintiff did use the women's shower, even though he is preparing for SRS. Use of the shower facilities, according to the article, is a required part of training. The suit also alleges that his supervisors and co-workers referred to him continually with female pronouns even after he had asked them not to. According to the article, the state's 1993 Human Rights Act protects gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgenders fom discrimination. The plaintiff's attorney, Sandra Grove, said that "we've tried very hard to work with the Police Department and the city before going forward with the lawsuit. He just wants to work. He wants to sort it out and not make money off of this." |
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Received from NGLTF ngltf@ngltf.org.
WASHINGTON, DC---January 25, 1999 --- In the 30th anniversary year of the Stonewall rebellion - the birth of the modern gay rights movement thousands of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people will launch an unprecedented national week of action for equality. Equality Begins at Home, slated for the week of March 21 27, is a major initiative to push state lawmakers to support a platform of equality. Planning for these by local activists is well under way. From Montana to Maine, gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people will come out and speak up in simultaneous events nationwide, most of which will take place at state capitols. These actions will, among other things, build support for laws that counter hate violence, ban employment discrimination, provide for safe schools for all students, ensure the right to adopt and become foster parents, and address health issues including HIV/AIDS. Equality Begins at Home is coordinated by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and organized by the Federation of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Statewide Political Organizations. As part of its coordinating efforts, the Task Force provided Federation member groups $5,000 each to support their Equality Begins at Home organizing efforts and hired a national coordinator for the event. Dozens of national organizations have signed on in support of this week of action. "Equality Begins at Home is not an end point but a beginning point. We are going to make our statewide organizations stronger, mobilize more people, register more voters, and demand greater accountability from our state legislators and policy makers," stated Kerry Lobel, National Gay and Lesbian Task Force executive director. "It is this organizing at the state level that will ultimately counter the hostility and gridlock we have come to know from our nationšs capital," she added. Never before in the history of the gay rights movement has there been a coordinated political campaign of actions in all 50 states as well as the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Equality Begins at Home represents a new phase of the movement - a focus on state organizing and legislatures. The vast majority of debates and decisions about gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender equality occur in state legislatures. Equality Begins at Home will bolster the infrastructure of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender movement within the states where the heart of the struggle for equality lies - and lead to greater success in the overall struggle for equality. Each state organization will develop events to highlight priority issues:
"The battleground for equality has moved to the states, and so have we," said Paula Ettelbrick, Equality Begins at Home national coordinator. "We are throwing down the gauntlet and demanding that state officials resist the right wing's efforts to deny us our basic rights as citizens," Ettelbrick added. . . .
"Our demands are simple and in line with basic American values: the right to be safe, to have a family, to hold a job, and to participate fully as citizens. It's exactly what every American wants and deserves," said Gina Reiss, co-chair of the Federation of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Statewide Political Organizations and executive director of New Jersey Lesbian and Gay Coalition. For more information, including a calendar of events and a list of state contacts, view the event web site at:
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From GLAADLINES. Web site: http://www.glaad.org.
In a breaking story, Net privacy groups are calling for Intel Corporation, the world's largest maker of PC computer chips, to disable new technology in its Pentium III chips. The new chip will transmit its unique serial number both internally and across the Internet in order to verify the identity of users. While consumers can disable the transmission of the identifier, it will re-enable itself once the computer is switched on again. "What Intel doesn't realize is that while it may be enhancing shopping on the Web, or helping track computer usage, it's also putting people at risk," said Loren Javier, GLAAD Interactive Media Director. "Young people may be identified as using lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender web sites long before they wish to discuss their sexual orientation with others. As with Navy officer Timothy McVeigh, Net privacy even now is subject to breaches by people. Imagine if your computer is giving away its equivalent of DNA every time you point and click? Those who have found some safety and support on the Net and remain in the closet will find this latest 'feature' from Intel problematic." . . .For more information, contact Loren Javier (GLAAD Interactive Media Director) at (925) 831-1092 or via email at javier@glaad.org. |
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Send news stories or comments to the editor at iphge@hotmail.com.
GenderNews Headlines GenderNews Index List of Community Notices |
Page prepared by Beth Lewis
According to a January 21, 1999 Minneapolis Star Tribune story by Rosalind
Bently, a Minneapolis police trainee is suing the police department and the
city, claiming that he has been denied access to appropriate restroom and
shower facilities because he is transgender.
Equality Begins at Home is part of a campaign to counter the growing
muscle of the right wing and its anti-gay attacks. In the last
few years, the right has passed dozens of anti-gay laws in dozens
of states. In addition, 1998 was one of the most vicious years
in recent memory. Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott likened
homosexuality to kleptomania and sex addiction. Congress introduced
a number of mean-spirited anti-gay measures. Right-wing groups
launched a major advertising campaign attacking gay, lesbian,
bisexual, and transgender people. In addition, voters approved
anti-gay ballot measures in Alaska; Hawaii; Fayetteville, Arkansas;
Fort Collins, Colorado; and Ogunquit, Maine.