Family Portrait: Timaree Schmit on being sex-savvy PAGE 29
“My Big Gay Illegal Wedding”
PAGE 8
“Lullaby on Broadway”
PAGE 9
Music to our ears PAGE 25
Feb. 14-20, 2014
����������
��� ������������ �������� �����������������������������������������
Vol. 38 No. 7
Penn launches new LGBT program By Angela Thomas angela@epgn.com
OUT FOR THE OLYMPICS: Olympics enthusiasts watched the opening ceremonies of the 2014 Winter Games at William Way LGBT Community Center Feb. 7. Dozens turned out throughout the event, which featured networking opportunities among athletes and allies, as well as the chance to learn about Philly’s LGBT sports clubs. Russia’s antigay policies have drawn considerable backlash against this year’s games and, with the banning of Pride Houses for LGBT athletes at the event, Remote Pride Houses, including William Way, have been springing up throughout the globe for supporters to lend their solidarity to LGBT Olympians and Russians. Tabu is also registered as a Remote Pride House and will be hosting Olympicsrelated events through the end of the games, Feb. 23. Photo: Scott A. Drake
Feds extend new bens to same-sex couples By Jen Colletta jen@epgn.com The nation’s top attorney last weekend announced that the federal government would recognize same-sex marriages, regardless of the marriage laws of the states in which couples live, to the fullest extent possible. At the Human Rights Campaign’s annual gala in New York City Saturday, and in a Monday memo, Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the Justice Department would apply this summer’s ruling overturning a key provision of the federal ban on same-sex marriage to all instances in which it has jurisdiction. “In every courthouse, in every proceeding and in every place where a member of the Department of Justice stands on behalf of the United States, they will strive to ensure that same-sex marriages receive the same privileges, protections and rights as opposite-sex marriages,” Holder said at the HRC fundraiser.
Among the memo’s stipulations, married same-sex couples will now be treated equal to married heterosexual couples in bankruptcy courts and federal prisons; be able to claim marital privilege in federal court cases; and same-sex spouses of police officers and other law-enforcement personnel killed in the line of duty will be granted full survivors’ benefits. “This landmark announcement will change the lives of countless committed gay and lesbian couples for the better,” said HRC president Chad Griffin. “While the immediate effect of these policy decisions is that all married gay couples will be treated equally under the law, the longterm effects are more profound. Today, our nation moves closer toward its ideals of equality and fairness for all.” Federal recognition for same-sex marriage has been gradually unfurling since June, when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a key provision of the federal Defense of Marriage Act. Since that time, several federal agenPAGE 21
Penn Medicine recently launched an innovative, multidisciplinary program focused on investigating and improving the health of the LGBT community. With its Penn Medicine Program for LGBT Health, Penn is the first academic medical center in the city to address LGBT health across several schools and hospitals, and joins just a handful of similarly situated programs across the nation. The program will focus on five key areas — climate, education, research, patient care and outreach — and will be implemented in the Perelman School of Medicine, Penn School of Nursing, Penn School of Dental Medicine and the Center for Public Health Initiatives.
Among its aims, the program will offer LGBT-focused training and advance LGBT awareness among faculty, students and staff; promote LGBT diversity in workplaces, classrooms and health-care settings; foster research on LGBT health issues; provide LGBT-sensitive patient care; and connect Penn and affiliated hospitals with the LGBT community. The Penn Medicine Program for LGBT Health is led by director Dr. Baligh Yehia, assistant professor of medicine at Perelman, who also serves as chair of the American Medical Association’s LGBT Advisory Committee and scientific chair of the national LGBT Health Workforce Conference. Yehia said the LGBT community has been overlooked in health-care realms, PAGE 16 which the program has
City denies request for two key Morris interviews By Timothy Cwiek timothy@epgn.com City attorneys say the Police Advisory Commission cannot release confidential interviews with William Jackson — a key witness in the Nizah Morris case — even though his public testimony is unavailable because the agency didn’t order a transcript. Morris was a transgender woman who became a homicide victim in 2002, shortly after getting inside a police vehicle for a “courtesy ride.” The case remains unsolved. Jackson was a passing motorist who saw Morris laying at 16th and Walnut streets shortly after the courtesy ride. In 2007, Jackson testified at a PAC hearing, but his testimony is permanently unavailable because PAC staffers failed to order a transcript. In 2011, the PAC obtained copies of two interviews with Jackson from the District Attorney’s Office. The city Law Department claims those interviews are off-limits to the public. Jackson is named in the Morris police report as a witness in support of the premise
that Morris was simply a drunk person who fell. But Jackson can be heard on 911 tapes saying he didn’t know what was wrong with the person. Officer Thomas Berry wrote the report, after responding to the scene at 16th and Walnut. In 2003, Berry told a detective that Jackson alerted him to the scene by flagging him down from a distance. But computerizeddispatch records state that Berry was alerted by police NIZAH MORRIS radio. If Berry noted in his paperwork that police radio alerted him, the entire incident couldn’t have been recorded as a “hospital case,” due to the configuration of policereporting forms. But Berry didn’t make that notation, and the entire incident was recorded as a hospital case — even during the time period when Morris was a courtesy-ride recipient. PAGE 22 As a result, none of the