NewsWrap for the week ending March 13th, 1999 (As broadcast on This Way Out program #572, distributed 3-15-99) [Compiled & written by Cindy Friedman, with thanks to Graham Underhill, Brian Nunes, Jason Lin, Martin Rice, Rex Wockner, Chris Ambidge, Alejandra Sarda, Greg Gordon & Lucia Chappelle] Anchored by Cindy Friedman and Leo Garcia Sweden's Parliament has voted for broad new protections from job discrimination based on sexual orientation. Effective May 1st, discrimination will be banned throughout the labor market and in all phases of employment from recruitment to dismissal. While the Swedish national gay and lesbian group RFSL welcomed the vote, they are dissatisfied by religious exemptions which include teaching positions at private schools. A teacher at a California public school who saw 15 of his students transferred out of his classes because their parents believe him to be gay, won a discrimination ruling this week from the state Labor Commission. The California Labor Commission found that by granting the transfers, the Rio Bravo-Greeley Union School District had "fostered 'different treatment in an aspect of employment' based upon perceived sexual orientation," in violation of state law. Dr. James Merrick is an award-winning veteran teacher who has never discussed his sexual orientation in any school-related setting. However, he gained visibility as part of an unsuccessful campaign to remove an anti-gay minister from the Kern County Human Relations Commission. Merrick said the ruling "sends a message at the state level that gay and lesbian teachers cannot be discriminated against in school. That's a powerful message that applies across the state and that's exciting." The school district has the option to appeal. A campaign for statewide protections from job discrimination based on sexual orientation has run into censorship in New Orleans. The group called LEGAL, for Louisiana Electorate of Gays and Lesbians, has placed billboards in Baton Rouge and Lake Charles reading, "Louisiana Says It's OK to Fire People Because They Are GAY -- Is That Fair?" But at the last minute, the company that contracted to post the message in New Orleans backed out. Outdoor Systems, Inc. says the ad is "inaccurate" because the city of New Orleans has a local job rights ordinance protecting gays and lesbians -- even though the billboard message is directed to the state. LEGAL spokesperson Christopher Daigle said, "Today we hoped to unveil a billboard campaign to help eradicate discrimination. Instead, we are yet another example of gay and lesbian people being discriminated against." LEGAL may sue the billboard company. An openly partnered Connecticut gay will be able to serve as an elder of his Presbyterian congregation, despite the U.S. denomination's ban on ordaining anyone not "repentant" of sex outside of traditional marriage. Wayne Osborne's First Presbyterian Church in Stamford was cleared of charges for having elected him, by a 4-to-1 vote this week of the Permanent Judiciary Commission of the Presbytery of Southern New England. This case is considered to be the first real test of the denomination’s 1997 law. When First Presbyterian's nominating committee asked Osborne if he engaged in homosexual acts, he simply declined to answer; later he said it was an inappropriate question which he wouldn't answer even for a friend. The majority opinion of the Commission said that unless sexual activity is revealed by "voluntary self-disclosure," it would be for the nominating process "to begin down a slippery slope that ends in inquisition." The complainants may appeal the ruling. When lesbian couples break up after having children by artificial insemination, what is the status of the non-biological co-parent for custody and visitation? That question has split a three-judge New Jesey state appeals panel three ways. One judge found the non-biological mother to have no right either to joint custody or visitation, another found a right to visitation only, and the third thought she had legal standing to seek both. As a result, the co-parent will obtain visitation rights, but the New Jersey state Supreme Court will have to take up the issue to resolve the appeals court's conflict. Meanwhile, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has heard oral arguments in another lesbian co-parent's lawsuit for visitation. Although that couple had signed two co-parenting agreements, the biological mother's attorney argued that they were not legal documents under state law. In a Los Angeles courtroom, a jury trial was aborted this week when Juan Chavez chose to plead guilty to the murders of five gay men. That plea saves him from the death penalty he might well have faced had the jury convicted him. Chavez would pose as a sex worker to be taken home by middle-aged gay men whom he strangled and robbed. Authorities believe he may have committed even more murders than the five he confessed to. The Hate Crimes Prevention Act was reintroduced in the U.S. Congress this week, and Vice President Al Gore issued a statement of support. President Bill Clinton has stated his strong support for the measure on numerous occasions. Gore referred to the bias-motivated murders of African-American James Byrd in Texas and of gays Matthew Shepard in Wyoming and Billy Jack Gaither in Alabama. He said they were "attacks not only on individuals, but against America and our shared values." However, savvy openly gay Representative Barney Frank has little hope for the bill's passage while Republicans hold the majority in both houses. State-level hate crimes bills were killed this week in Indiana and Oklahoma, although in Oklahoma there's a movement for reintroduction. Hawai’i's state Senate passed a hate crimes bill unanimously. Gay-bashing victim and literary figure Robert Drake will get help from Ireland's national health care system to return to the U.S. when he's physically able. He remains in a coma in a Dublin hospital after sustaining serious head injuries in a beating several weeks ago. Former Justice Minister Nora Owen brought the issue of Drake's transportation before the Irish parliament, and this week Ireland's North Western Health Board pledged its assistance. Drake's two admitted assailants, Ian Monaghan and Glen Mahon, are free on bail on charges of "causing serious harm," which could result in anything from a fine to life imprisonment. Arson was committed not once but twice this week against a soon-to-be-opened Fort Lauderdale, Florida gay and lesbian nightclub. The club known as The Pier had not been widely known as a gay and lesbian venue until an article about its scheduled opening appeared in a local paper just two days before the first fire. Both fires were quickly discovered and extinguished, but did hundreds of dollars worth of damage to the club's exterior. Police say they have some strong leads, but no suspects as yet. The Miami area's oldest gay club, the Boardwalk, fell victim to a zoning law in what recently became Sunny Isles Beach. Although there were no known citizen complaints against the bar, and the business community joined the gay community in supporting it, Sunny Isles commissioners voted 3 - 2 against allowing male strippers to continue to perform there. There are several heterosexual strip joints operating in the same neighborhood, and the Boardwalk's owners will probably appeal. Zoning laws were also significant this week in Argentina, as the reinstatement of laws in Buenos Aires against sex trade in public led to a noisy demonstration by a group of transgender and other activists. Those laws have served in the past to make transgenders fair game for police abuse. With Britain's Prince Charles visiting the country but not present for the protest, the group of about 70 demonstrated outside the British embassy residence. Embassy staff called police when the protestors pulled the gate open. Police used truncheons to beat back the crowd, sending one transsexual to the hospital. But the protesters ultimately succeeded in giving the staff a petition signed by 67 people requesting "political asylum because of discrimination." Although transgenders and other marginalized groups had gained new freedoms when Buenos Aires became politically autonomous in 1996, the law-and-order electoral campaigning of Argentina's President Carlos Menem and his opponent Buenos Aires Mayor Fernando de la Rua have rolled back those gains. Puerto Rico's "crimes against nature" law will have to face a court challenge by the American Civil Liberties Union, as a judge this week rejected the Secretary of Justice's motion to dismiss the case. That motion, according to the ACLU, had suggested "that nobody is injured when the government brands gay men and lesbians as criminals because of their intimate relationships.". But Superior Court Judge Carmen Rita Velez Borras recognized that the existence of the law -- combined with threats of its enforcement -- have a "chilling effect" on sexual expression and relationships. Lead plaintiff Reverend Margarita Sanchez said it was "a wonderful day for me, my partner and for all other lesbians and gay men in Puerto Rico who have had to live under the cloud of this law." And finally ... openly gay singer Rufus Wainwright has won a coveted Juno award, the Canadian recording industry's equivalent of the Grammy's. Wainwright recently remarked that when he's mobbed by screaming young female fans, he feels like "I'm Luke Skywalker, surrounded by the Ewoks."