NewsWrap for the week ending January 17, 2004 (As broadcast on This Way Out program #825, distributed 1-19-04) [Written by Cindy Friedman, with thanks to Graham Underhill, Fenceberry, Rex Wockner, and Greg Gordon] Anchored this week by Cindy Friedman and Rick Watts Criminal proceedings against the suspect in the near-fatal 2002 stabbing of openly gay Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoë ended this week. A judge dismissed the criminal charges against Azedine Berkane, declaring him mentally unfit to stand trial and ordering that he be sent to a psychiatric hospital. Three teams of psychiatrists had examined Berkane, two of them finding him unfit to stand trial. Berkane reportedly told police that he attacked Delanoë out of his antipathy towards homosexuals. Another high-profile gay-bashing case closed in late December as the lead suspect in the 2001 killing of Vancouver, Canada gay Aaron Webster was given the maximum sentence for manslaughter. That's 3 years with at least 2 to be served behind bars. While many feel it's not enough, Judge Valmond Romilly took the unusual step of going beyond what prosecutors had asked for, which was only 20 to 32 months. Prosecutors were not convinced that Webster's attackers acted out of homophobia, apparently because the suspect -- who cannot be named because he was a minor at the time -- told them he was hunting peeping toms rather than gays. But the judge saw it differently, and called it an "abhorrent and heinous crime" committed with premeditation. Webster's death sparked rallies and a new level of community activism against hate violence. The number of anti-gay attacks in the Australian state of New South Wales is essentially unchanged since a decade ago, according to a new report from the state Attorney General's Department. The report called "You Shouldn't Have to Hide to Be Safe" is based primarily on a survey of more than 600 gays and lesbians. About 85% reported experiencing homophobic abuse or violence, 56% of them within the previous 12 months. Those figures are quite close to the results of a police survey performed in 1994. The lack of progress shocked and saddened many in the state of the famous Sydney Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras. The only bright spot was the increased willingness of gays and lesbians to respond to the survey. Northern Ireland's Department of Education commissioned a survey of more than 360 lesbigay and trans people under age 25 with grim results. More than 60% said they'd experienced negative attitudes towards their sexual orientation in school, with 44% experiencing outright bullying. Only about one in 7 of those experiencing negative attitudes had sought help, with almost 30% attempting suicide. For all the respondents there was five times the rate of medication for depression and 20 times the rate of eating disorders than for students at large. A new study of anti-gay harassment in schools was also released this week in the U.S. state of California. The state circulated a health risk survey in the 2001 - 2002 school year and 237,000 teenaged students responded. 7.5% of those students reported being targeted by bullies because of their actual or perceived sexual orientation. Their resulting fear led them to miss school three times more often than other students, and they were twice as likely to be d epressed or suicidal. The California Safe Schools Coalition this week added the findings of its companion survey of more than 600 students. They found that explicit school policies against homophobic harassment, training for teachers on how to intervene, and the presence of Gay Straight Alliance clubs made a real difference in decreasing anti-gay incidents on campus. Atlanta, Georgia's ordinance prohibiting sexual orientation discrimination received its first test this week as a lesbian and a gay man sought spousal privileges for their partners at a private country club. The city's Human Relations Commission held its first-ever formal hearing for the complaint brought by Lee Kyser and Randy New against the Druid Hills Golf Club, where they pay dues of $475 per month following an initial membership fee of $40,000. Spousal privileges include inheriting the membership when the member dies, as well as being able to use the golf course without additional fees. While the Commission's official statement is still being drafted, the panel believes the club violated the ordinance. What's believed to be the nation's only similar case involving a country club is currently in a California appeals court. New Jersey Governor James McGreevey this week signed into law a bill extending some limited legal recognition to same-gender domestic partners, which will go into effect in June. New Jersey is only the 5th US state to formally recognize those partnerships. Primarily opening spousal benefits to the partners of state employees, the bill also creates a registry open to all gay and lesbian couples and to heterosexual couples over age 62. Registry carries some of the medical, taxation and private insurance benefits of marriage, and discrimination based on "domestic partnership status" is prohibited. That status will also be granted to couples who have contracted legal partnerships in other states. The House of Representatives of Trinidad and Tobago this week unanimously approved a revised Extradition Bill that protects lesbigay and trans people. The bill denies extradition from Trinidad and Tobago in cases where the request "is based on [the individual's] sex, gender or sexual preference." The move was unusual because Trinidad and Tobago still criminalize sex between men, yet it was not contested during debate on the bill. A gay couple in Latvia this week held what's believed to be the first same-gender wedding in the Baltic region -- or at least the first known to the public. Oskars Krumins and Aigars Rubezis were joined in a commitment ceremony in Riga performed by Maris Sants, a pastor previously suspended by Latvia's Evangelical Lutheran Church after publicly stating his own homosexual orientation. Attending along with about 40 family and friends were reporters from Lithuania's Independent Television. The grooms deemed Latvia's own media too unfriendly to be present, although they'll be holding a press conference for them in the coming week. Latvia currently offers no legal recognition to same-gender couples, a situation the men hope that publicizing their relationship will help to change. Illustrating the resistance, a Latvian legislative committee working to bring national labor laws into conformance with European Union standards this week refused to include in their draft a provision to prohibit sexual orientation discrimination. But Krumins said that he expects the gay and lesbian youth support group he heads will become the Baltic region's first sexual minority organization to win official registry when Latvia's Company Registry considers applications in a couple of weeks. The Vatican's global campaign against legal recognition of same-gender couples took a personal turn this week with the publication of a letter from a partnered lesbian relative of Australia's top Catholic leader, staunch conservative Cardinal George Pell. Though only Pell's second cousin once removed, Monica Hingston has a bond with him, and both she and her partner of 19 years Peg Moran spent most of their adult lives as nuns. Offended by the Vatican's language in recent documents on homosexuality -- terms like "seriously depraved" and "gravely immoral" -- Hingston felt a need to speak up. But she only went public with her letter after months of repeated failure to gain any response from Pell to it or to phone calls. In her letter she movingly describes her relationship, calling it "a rare and precious gift" and "life-giving". She criticizes the Vatican at length, saying, "These prelates are obsessed with how we physically show our love for each other," and notes that the same logic used against gay and lesbian couples would apply to all infertile couples. She calls the Vatican "arrogant" in presuming to dictate to elected officials. She asks Pell to give her a personal response from the heart, and to consider what he's actually saying to people like herself. Once her letter had appeared in newspapers, Pell issued a short public statement that, "The church's views are well known and will not change. I support them." He added as "food for thought" a reference to the gospel verse in which Jesus said, "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone." And finally... as the Scots say in a phrase made famous by TV, there's naught as queer as folk -- and now you can announce that in the legal name of a New York non-profit group. The Department of State there this week finally green lighted two groups to incorporate under their chosen names, Queer Awareness and Queers for Economic Justice, reversing its November decision against them just 3 weeks before a court hearing. Previously the state had deemed the word to be indecent and degrading and therefore banned under New York's Not-for-Profit Corporation Law. Christopher Benecke founded Queer Awareness in the belief that the label is the most inclusive for non-heterosexuals, and at age 24 says he's never had any problems with the word that was once an insult. He self-identifies as "gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender". Also a paralegal, he filed a lawsuit demanding to have the q-word in his group's legal name as part of his right to free speech. In announcing the Department of State's change of heart this week, a spokesperson said only, "After taking a closer look, it was decided that the word queer is mainstream enough that it probably won't be objectionable, so we will allow its use."