Miami Beach Police Disciplined for False Charges Against Gay Tourist Who Turned Them In For Beating
Miami Beach, FL – “What is happening in Miami Beach?” — Miami Herald reader Jeffrey Garcia questioned Miami Beach Police Chief Carlos Noriega after reports that two MBPD officers falsely charged a gay tourist. The officers were apparently unaware that the tourist was speaking on his cellphone to the 911 line to report them for beating a man on the street. The large majority of the abusive arrest, shouts by the officers of anti-gay epithets, and their physical assault on gay tourist Harold Strickland were all recorded for the world to hear. Once they realized the tourist was reporting them, they allegedly made up charges against him that have now been dropped. Under pressure from the ACLU of Florida, both MBPD Officers Frankly Forte and Elliot Hazzi have been put on desk duty while the investigation against them proceeds. The Chief’s assurances of good relations with the Miami Beach LGBT community to the contrary, a flurry of reports are emerging that Miami, Miami Beach, South Beach, and other Dade County locales once considered gay Meccas are no longer safe for queer folk. The made up charges against Mr. Strickland are the most recent example. According to Miami Herald reports, Mr. Strickland observed two men beating a person at about 1 a.m. on March 13, 2009 in the Flamingo Park area of Miami Beach. As Steve Rothaus of the Herald reports, “Strickland called 911 when he saw a man being beaten by two men just outside the park. ‘I saw a guy running and then I saw two, what looked like undercover cops running. And they pushed this guy down on the ground, the one cop did, and the other cop came up as if he was kicking a football … and kicked the guy in the head,” Strickland told a dispatcher during a recorded phone call to 911.” Rothaus continues his report, “For nearly five minutes, he talked to the dispatcher, who encouraged him to get closer for more detail ‘if it doesn’t put you in any danger.’ A few seconds later, Strickland told the dispatcher: “Now they’re coming after me!”” The officers, Forte and Hazzi, demanded to know what Mr. Strickland was doing. According to a spokesperson for the ACLU,they then grabbed his cellphone away from him and said, “We know what you’re doing here. We’re sick of all the f—ing fags in the neighborhood.” Pushing him to the ground, they bound Mr. Strickland’s hands and proceeded to kick and beat him, hurling anti-gay slurs at him. The ACLU report continues, “While Strickland was on the ground, the officers continued to spew anti-gay epithets. They called him a ‘f—ing fag’ and told him he was going to ‘get it good in jail.”’ Though Mr. Strickland tried to tell the officers about his call to 911, they would not listen. They arrested him on prowling-and-loitering charges. A half hour later, Officer Forte in his arrest report charged Mr. Strickland with breaking into six cars in the area. In a hearing the next morning, a judge advised Mr. Strickland that he would get out of jail quicker if he would plead guilty to misdemeanor charges. He did, but as soon as he was free, he called the ACLU, and changed his plea to not guilty. The State Attorney General’s Office has dropped all charges against Mr. Strickland, as well as loitering and resisting arrest charges against Mr. Oscar Mendoza, the man Mr. Strickland saw Officers Forte and Hazzi beat near Flamingo Park. The ACLU has informed the mayor of Miami Beach that they will sue both the offending officers and the city for the incident. Robert F. Rosenwald Jr., director of the ACLU Florida’s Lesbian-Gay-Bisexual-Transgender Advocacy Project, told the Herald’s Steve Rothaus, “This is an issue that we have hoped to address for a long time. Miami Beach Police have for a long time harassed gay men around Flamingo Park without probable cause.”
Trans Community Demands Justice for Myra Ical
Houston, TX – Cristan Williams, Executive Director of the Transgender Foundation of America, takes the murder of Myra Ical personally. “She died struggling for her life…She went down fighting and she was literally beaten to death,” she said to reporters for KHOU 11 News. “It’s personal. I feel it on a personal level.” Hundreds agree with Williams. Myra Chanel Ical, 51, died in a Montrose area field a week ago, and Houston’s transgender community has rallied to her memory. Seven members of the transgender community have died violently in Houston in the last eleven years, and now the vigil organized to remember Ms. Ical on Monday night is being billed as the largest transgender event in Houston’s history. The vigil’s organizers intend to focus attention on the plight of transgender people in Harris County and Houston as they honor Ms. Ical’s memory and call for neighbors in Montrose to share any leads they may have on the unsolved murder with police investigators. While her slaying is not yet designated as a hate crime, police are certainly not ruling anything out. Sgt. Bobby Roberts, spokesperson for the Houston Police Department, told reporters, “It could have been anything at this point. We just don’t have any motive whatsoever on this case.” ABC News 13 reports that Ms. Ical’s body was covered in bruises and bore several defensive-type wounds that showed she was fighting back against her attacker(s). Harris County’s Medical Examiner ruled that she died from strangulation by some sort of ligature. Cristan Williams cannot get the horror of how Ms. Ical died out of her mind. “That in and of itself was just a horrific way to die. Her last moments of life were sheer terror.” Williams asks why none of the seven murders of Houston transgender people have been solved. Police told her they have no evidence in any of the cases, something Williams attributes to the way anti-transgender crimes went largely unreported in the recent past. Until the passage of the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act this past October, local and federal law enforcement agencies were not mandated to keep statistics on transgender hate crimes. Like the transgender population, these crimes were largely ignored. Human rights advocates for the LGBT community are watching closely to see if the election of Annise Parker, an open and out lesbian, as Mayor of Houston will make a difference in how law enforcement and the media approach violence against some of the most vulnerable citizens of America’s 4th largest city.
Major Media Fail Over Murder of Houston Transwoman
Houston, TX – Myra Ical lived and died as a transwoman, but the Houston media have not given her the dignity of acknowledging her gender identity when reporting on her likely hate murder. The Houston Chronicle reported Ical’s January 18 murder in the Montrose section using exclusively male pronouns, calling her male, and playing up the sensational aspects of the area where homeless people eek out a living. As is often sadly the case in reportage that is lazy and salacious, the Chronicle used innuendo to suggest that Ical, whose body was found partially naked and covered with bruises and defensive injuries indicative of her fight with her attacker(s), was consorting with prostitutes and drug addicts. Local and national LGBT rights organizations have pushed back against this media injustice by calling attention to Ms. Ical’s gender identity and expression, and demanding that reportage get this aspect of such a terrible story right. According to The Advocate, Human Rights Campaign board member and Pride Houston president Meghan Stabler submitted a strongly worded letter on behalf of both organizations to media outlets covering Ms. Ical’s murder, urging reporters to “use fair, accurate and inclusive reporting” when reporting on LGBT issues. The letter read, in part: “On Monday January 18 the brutal murder of Myra Ical occurred in Houston. She is a transgender woman but the media continue to use male pronouns along with colorful statements about being found in an area known for drugs and prostitution. This lazy and irresponsible journalism shows the amount of ignorance about transgender issues that is rampant among far too many reporters despite the existence of resources to help them report accurately.” GLAAD and the AP have clear guidelines on how LGBT-oriented stories should be reported, leaving big media like the Houston Chronicle without excuse. Myra Ical, who was 51 when she died, will be remembered at a candlelight vigil near the site of her murder at the corner of Richmond Avenue and Garrott Street on Monday, January 25, from 6-6:30 pm. The Facebook notice for the vigil calls upon media and the Houston Police Department “to communicate with the public in a way that respects the victim.” Thanks to Daniel Williams for breaking this story in the DFW metroplex.
Queens Gay Bashers Indicted for Hate Crimes
Queens, NY – Both men charged with the savage assault that left gay New Yorker Jack Price near death in mid-October have been indicted for 14 counts of assault and robbery as a hate crime, as well as possession of stolen property. Daniel Rodriguez, 21, and Daniel Aleman, 26, both from College Point, Queens, allegedly attacked Jack Price, 49, early in the morning on October 8. The assault, sudden and brutal, lasted for roughly three minutes. A surveillance camera caught the bashing on tape, a damning piece of evidence the defense will have a hard time explaining away. According to Gay City News, if convicted, each defendant could receive up to 25 years in prison, with the stipulation that neither of them could be released before 21 years of the sentence had been served. Police investigators said that the bashing took place 4:30 a.m. on October 8 as Price was leaving a local 24-hour delicatessen. Rodriguez and Aleman allegedly accosted Price in the deli as he was buying a pack of cigarettes, and then followed him outside to press their attack. During the beating, Rodriguez allegedly yelled at Price repeatedly, calling him a “faggot.” After rifling through his pockets, the pair shown on camera left the scene. Price, before falling into a coma, was able to identify his assailants to police. Unbeknownst to Rodriguez and Aleman, who allegedly taunted him in Spanish, Price understood the language, and gave details of what he heard to the investigators. Price lay in the New York Medical Center of Queens for better than three weeks, suffering from a broken jaw, a lacerated spleen, broken ribs, and two collapsed lungs. Protests against hate violence were organized swiftly, the largest of them comprised of over 500 who demanded justice for Price. A small contingent of supporters of the defendants staged a counter-protest. Aleman was arrested in short order in Queens. Rodriguez fled to Norfolk, Virginia, where he was arrested on October 13. After his transport back to Queens for arraignment, Rodriguez confessed to NYPD officers that he assaulted Price, and gave the following details of the run-up to the attack, according to WABC News: “According to prosecutors, Rodriguez admitted he and the other suspect Daniel Aleman confronted Price believing he was about to write his phone number on a wall in order to solicit other men. It was that confrontation that led to the beating. Prosecutors also say Rodriguez admitted to yelling anti-gay epithets while beating Price. Rodriguez’s attorney says that his client never confessed and that the NYPD detectives basically put words in his client’s mouth.” Price counters that he never wrote graffiti on the deli wall, and did nothing to provoke the attack. Rodriguez’s animus toward Price was clear to investigators who report that Rodriguez admitted to using the anti-gay slurs because “Jack is disgusting.” Both defendants are being held at Riker’s Island without bail. Price has substantially recovered from the physical aspects of the beating, but the psychological injuries he sustained will take a lifetime to cope with. When he woke up from his coma in the hospital, he told relatives that he was “surprised to be alive.”
Indiana University Breaks Silence on Black Gay Professor’s Murder
Bloomington, IN – After a long silence, the Provost of Indiana University at Bloomington issued an official statement January 11 on the suspected hate killing of black gay professor, Dr. Don Belton, whose body was found stabbed multiple times in the kitchen of his home on December 27. Critics of the university administration suggested that stony silence about the circumstances of Dr. Belton’s murder was damaging his reputation in an already sensationalized media atmosphere. An ex-Marine, Michael J. Griffin, 25, has confessed to the crime as revenge for two sexual assaults allegedly perpetrated on him by the 53-year-old African American professor at a Christmas party. Friends and colleagues of Dr. Belton are working diligently to overthrow this suspicious “gay panic” motive on the grounds that Dr. Belton was never the sort of man to assault anyone. Griffin is being held without bail in the Monroe County jail awaiting trial. Dr. Belton’s murder is part of an emerging pattern of hate killings of black gay academics in the United States. Dr. Lindon Barrett, 46-year-old professor of English and African American Studies at the University of California – Irvine, was strangled to death in 2008. Dr. Barrett’s alleged killer, Marlon Martinez, 22, was to stand trial in early 2010 for the murder, but was found dead in his Los Angeles County jail cell on Christmas Day. The Long Beach Press Telegram reports that the cause of Martinez’s death is as yet undetermined. The statement of the provost of IUB is printed here in full:
Dear Faculty, Staff, and Students,
As the campus begins the new semester, we must acknowledge a terrible loss. Some of you may just now be returning to campus after the holidays, and I am very sad to inform you that the Indiana University community lost a dear colleague during the semester break.
Don Belton, a faculty member in the English Department, was slain at his home in Bloomington on December 27. (An arrest has been made in the case.)
In his relatively brief time at IUB, Professor Belton earned the admiration and affection of his colleagues and students.
He was a gifted writer and a highly-valued member of the faculty of our distinguished Creative Writing Program, in the Department of English. He was very well liked and very well-respected. His death is a loss not just to his family and friends, and our academic community, but also to the extended world of arts and letters and to all who value the humanistic traditions. His absence will be profoundly felt.
The murder of Professor Belton has evoked strong emotions throughout the community and indeed the nation. I trust that all members of our community will exhibit tolerance, compassion, and respect in the wake of the loss of a valued
colleague. Let us also show respect for one another and for the many and varied ways in which we express our grief over such a tragedy.
A memorial service to celebrate the life of Professor Belton will take place on Friday January 15, at 5 p.m. at the Unitarian Universalist Church on Fee Lane in Bloomington.
Our heartfelt sympathies go out to Professor Belton’s family, friends, and colleagues.
Karen Hanson
Provost and Executive Vice President
Ricky Martin Speaks Out Against Anti-LGBT Hate Violence in Puerto Rico
Legendary Latino entertainment idol, Ricky Martin (né Enrique José Martín Morales) spoke out against anti-LGBT hate crimes in his native Puerto Rico on Sunday in an op-ed written for El Nuevo Dia. Martin, who has been the subject of persistent rumors concerning his own sexual orientation for years, is one of a growing chorus of Puerto Rican and other Latino/Latina entertainers who are decrying the spiking incidence of homophobic attacks on gay and gender non-conforming men in the United States Territory. The brutal murder of Jorge Steven López Mercado, the 19-year-old gay man who was found decapitated, dismembered, and partially immolated in Cayey last month, has drawn national and international attention to the problem of cultural homophobia in the Caribbean. Now, with the emerging story of what may well be another anti-gay murder in Ponce this past Wednesday, Martin and others have taken it upon themselves to speak out. Olga Tañón, the talk radio personality, René Perez,the reggaeton artist, and 2001 Miss Universe Denise Quiñones are among other celebrities who are becoming outspoken on the issue along with Martin. Boy in Bushwick quotes Martin as writing, “The deaths of James Byrd, like that of Matthew Shepard, Jorge Steven López, Marcelo Lucero and Luis Ramírez, like other victims of violent hate crimes, should be unacceptable to all human beings; because we are all human beings.” Martin urged his readers to move beyond mere acceptance and toleration. “If we accept each other, humanity will come together,” Martin wrote. “And if humanity comes together, equality for human rights will become a reality. If equality for human rights becomes a reality, peace will be within our reach.” For high-profiled Martin, 38, to speak out so openly against homophobic violence is something of an event in itself. He has consistently denied rumors about his own sexual orientation since the days he was lead singer for the pop group Menudo, and played a popular character in television’s General Hospital. In 1999 he was named one of People Magazine’s “50 Most Beautiful People.” But it was as a singer that the photogenic Puerto Ricaño made his most lasting reputation, with such English-language hits as “Livin’ La Vida Loca.” Last year Martin announced the birth of twin sons by a surrogate mother. The babies, Matteo and Valentino, were frequently photographed in their father’s arms, furthering a wholesome image Martin’s publicists have attempted to blend with his smoldering on-screen persona that made him a pop idol in the late 1990’s. Martin has forayed into public affairs before. He created the “Ricky Martin Foundation” which gave a million dollars’ worth of musical instrument to Puerto Rican public schools. The Foundation is also deeply involved in helping children who are victims of child prostitution and/or pornography, especially in India but also all around the world. According to Martin, “This is the biggest problem our society is going to face within the next 10 years.” This Sunday’s op-ed column, however, is the most outspoken Martin has ever become on the issue of LGBT concerns, and is both a measure of his growing maturity and the degree to which the recent horrific murders of gay men on his home island has shaken him in recent days.
Arrest Made in Possible Hate Crime Murder in Puerto Rico
Ponce, Puerto Rico – Police arrested a suspect in the latest grisly murder in Puerto Rico over the weekend, according to EDGE Boston’s Michael Lavers. Luis Díaz Rodríguez, 34, was jailed late Saturday night in connection with the December 16 murder of Fernando Vargas López de Victoria, 35 years of age, in a room in Ponce’s Motel Las Colinas (shown in photo at left). Investigators reported that the victim, 5’1″ and 230 lbs., was found naked, lying face down. He had been savagely stabbed 20 times and his throat had been slit. The pattern of wounds on the victim’s hands and arms is consistent with a person struggling in self-defense. Police Sergeant Richard Nazario told reporters for El Nuevo Dia that Díaz Rodríguez and López de Victoria arrived at the hotel on Tuesday, Dec. 15. He said the two men began to smoke crack cocaine inside their room, and the attack took place in the course of “an argument.” Motel employees,who apparently recognized the victim, said López de Victoria worked for Puerto Rico’s Department of Housing. He was thought to be gay, but there is no confirmation at the time of this report. Díaz Rodríguez is charged with first degree murder and several weapons crimes, and is being held on $800,000 bond as the investigation continues. LGBT activist spokesman for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, Pedro Julio Serrano has called for the case to be treated as an anti-LGBT hate crime murder. “Given that the victim is thought to have arrived at the motel with another man, the brutality of the crime, the hate with which it was committed, we must insist that the authorities investigate this as a hate crime,” he said.
Another Brutal Murder in Puerto Rico
Ponce, Puerto Rico – Boy in Bushwick who runs a fine blog reports that an unidentified man was found horrifically stabbed and slashed to death in a Ponce motel on December 16. The 40-45-year-old man, believed to be gay, was found nude in a Motel Las Colinas room with his throat slashed and 20 stab wounds in areas of his body consistent with injuries someone would sustain who tried to defend himself. Investigators on the scene told local reporters that the unidentified victim checked into the motel the day before with another man. This second man left the motel at about 1:30 pm on Wednesday. Police are trying to find him for questioning. The Dallas Voice, quick to pick up on the story, observes that this savage stabbing death occurred just a little over a month after the most notorious anti-gay hate crime in Puerto Rican history took place in Cayey. Jorge Steven López Mercado, a gay 19-year-old who was well known in the Puerto Rican LGBT community, was decapitated, dismembered, and partially immolated on November 13. Juan A. Martínez Matos, 26, has confessed to the murder and is copping to a form of the “gay panic defense” as an excuse for his actions. The López Mercado hate crime murder drew international attention, and uncovered the homophobic underside of society in the United States Territory. Some attempts are being made to besmirch the character of the unidentified murder victim, using innuendo to suggest that since he checked into the motel with another man, something like this was more likely to happen. Pedro Julio Serrano, the leading activist voice of the Puerto Rican LGBT community, is attempting to pre-empt this none-too-subtle homophobic/heterosexist tactic. Boy in Bushwick quotes Serrano as saying to Spanish-speaking media, “[Despite] the particular circumstances of his arrival at the motel with another man, the brutality of his murder, the hate with which [the second man allegedly] committed it and through clear signs of cruelty, we ask the authorities to investigate the hate angle in this case.”
López Mercado Murder To Be Treated as Anti-LGBT Hate Crime Killing
San Juan, Puerto Rico – A federal prosecutor in San Juan has announced that her office is continually monitoring the investigation of the horrific torture-murder of Jorge Steven López Mercado, and promised that she will bring hate crimes charges in the event that Puerto Rican authorities do not. The EDGE reports that United States Attorney Rosa Emilia Rodríguez told the Puerto Rican press she was prepared to lodge anti-LGBT hate crimes charges against Juan A. Martínez Matos, the self-confessed killer of the 19-year-old out gay youth. If she carries through, this will be the first prosecution under the provisions of the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act since it was signed into law by President Barack Obama in October. Martínez Matos, 26, allegedly decapitated, dismembered, and attempted to immolate López Mercado, dumping his remains on a lonely stretch of road outside Cayey on November 13. As an excuse for his crime, the alleged killer has claimed that he was surprised to find out that the youth, who was dressed as a female, was actually a gay person. Believing that Puerto Rican attitudes are still conservative enough to credit some form of the well-worn “gay panic” defense, Martínez Matos says that previous bad encounters with a gay man in his youth caused him to explode with rage. A judge has ruled that Martínez Matos must undergo psychological evaluation to establish that he is mentally healthy enough to stand trial. Local LGBT activists have decried the ruling, but are welcoming the announcement of the United States Attorney that hate crime charges may be brought in this case. Pedro Julio Serrano said to the EDGE, “We are satisfied that the federal authorities are monitoring this case and that they’re respecting the work that the local authorities are doing. We are all vigilant to this process and we won’t rest until justice is served. This was a horrible hate crime and Puerto Rico needs to send a powerful message to the world that we do not tolerate homophobia in any of its ugly forms.”
Bad Hombres: Arrests in Possible Anti-LGBT Violence in West Texas
Brewster County, TX – Two men have been arrested and charged with kidnapping and sexually assaulting a 19-year-old man in Terlingua, Texas on Sunday, December 6 in what is unfolding into a possible anti-gay hate crime story. While the sexual orientation of the victim remains officially undisclosed, local sources allege that the teenager is gay. Daniel Martinez, 46, has been charged with sexual assault and is being held on $35,000 bond. Kristopher Buchanan, 27, is being held on outstanding warrants from other counties. The suspects are expected to face additional charges. Pink News summarizes reports from Texas saying that the victim ,whose name has not been released by law enforcement, was abducted outside a bar in Terlingua, a town on the Texas-Mexico Border, and driven in his own car to a remote area in southern Brewster County. The Big Bend Gazette reports that the youth was sexually assaulted by the pair before his car was set afire. He was forced into a private residence where his attackers sexually assaulted him again. He managed to escape, running three miles across the desert to a highway where a Brewster County Sheriff’s Deputy spotted him and took him to a hospital for treatment. Officials say that the victim is currently recovering in an undisclosed location. Law enforcement has been tight-lipped about the crime, but both local and LGBT press have speculated that the assault was an anti-gay hate crime. Some have gone so far as to equate the attack with the fatal pistol-whipping of hate crime victim Matthew Shepard. When questioned about the investigation, Brewster County Sheriff Ronny Dodson told reporters that the case is being treated as a kidnapping, sexual assault and auto arson. “Everybody’s in jail,” said Dodson. “That’s the best part.” A rally was held last night in support of the victim.





Summer 2009 – Dr. Sprinkle responded to the Fort Worth Police Department and Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission Raid on the Rainbow Lounge, Fort Worth’s newest gay bar, on June 28, 2009, the exact 40th Anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion. Dr. Sprinkle was invited to speak at three protest events sponsored by Queer LiberAction of Dallas. Here, he is keynoting the Rainbow Lounge Protest at the Tarrant County Courthouse on July 12, 2009. 

