Newsgroups: soc.motss Path: news.intercon.com!udel!gatech!howland.reston.ans.net!spool.mu.edu!news.clark.edu!netnews.nwnet.net!steele!ohsu.edu!hansenr From: hansenr@ohsu.edu (Robert Hansen) Subject: Man Sues OCA for being labeled homosexual Message-ID: Sender: news@ohsu.edu Nntp-Posting-Host: 137.53.54.32 Organization: Oregon Health Sciences University Date: Thu, 4 Nov 1993 16:41:34 GMT Lines: 60 (reprinted from The Oregonian - without permission - 11/4/93) FAMILY, FRIENDS TELL OF PAIN FROM HOMOSEXUAL LABEL * Lon Mabon tells a trial of a $500,000 defamation suit that it was a simple mistake * EUGENE - Lon Mabon, head of the Oregon Citizens Alliance, testified Tuesday that it was a simple mistake when he labeled the head of Springfield's Human Rights Commission a practicing homosexual. But George Wickizer's wife, friends and acquaintances told a Lane County jury that they and others assumed the statement meant Wickizer. The resulting harassment and snubs have changed his life, they said. When Mabon made the statement at an October 1991 news conference, Wickizer, who is heterosexual, had been the only man ever to head the human rights panel. He had resigned two months earlier. He is suing the OCA and its officials for $500,000, claiming the defamed him with the label. Mabon acknowledged Tuesday that he read the statement when the OCA began its first Oregon anti-gay-rights initiative measure campaign in Springfield. But he said he meant to refer to another man whom he mistakenly thought had been appointed to the commission. The group sent a second news release the same day but did not call a second news conference to correct the error, Mabon said. "We felt at the time that it was a simple statement that could be easily corrected," he said. Wickizer's wife, Sylvia, said the mistake was a disaster that's changed her husband from a warm, outgoing family man into a distant, cold one. They received dozens of harassing telephone calls, passing motorists shouted insults and people they know well have ignored them in public, even recently, she said. Their youngest son has been called names at school, she said, and their marriage has suffered. Her husband has withdrawn from their social life and their sex life, she said. "He just told me he was sorry for the way things were, but he just couldn't even stand the word 'sex,'" she said. Friends and acquaintances told the jury Tuesday that people they knew assumed George Wickizer was homosexcual because of reports on the news conference. A year after Mabon made the statement, a co-worker asked, in front of others, if Wickizer was gay, said Brian J. Byrne, a director of the credit union Wickizer manages. ROBERT HANSEN - Oregon Health Sciences University - Portland, Oregon USA - - - - "I was born with my mother's features and my father's fixtures" Sister Paula, transsexual evangelist