Texas gay community outraged at nightclub raid
Published: June 29, 2009
Updated 4 months ago
Update: Human Rights Campaign calls for investigation
The Human Rights Campaign has called for an investigation into the police raid of a Fort Worth, Texas gay bar.
“Brutality at the hands of law enforcement is never acceptable and these allegations demonstrate the need for a thorough and impartial investigation,” said Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese, in a media advisory sent to RAW STORY. “We applaud the Fort Worth community for seeking answers to these very serious charges.”
RAW STORY’s original report follows.
####
Forty years to the day after Stonewall — when a police raid of a New York gay club led to riots and launched the modern gay-rights movement — police in Fort Worth, TX, are being accused of repeating the incident.
Early Sunday morning, Fort Worth police, accompanied by agents of the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission, raided the Rainbow Lounge, a newly-opened gay club in Fort Worth.
According to CBS 11 News, “seven people were arrested for public intoxication and at least a dozen more were restrained. The incident was captured on camera and posted on local blogs. The scene was the topic of conversation at Sunday’s Million Gay March in Dallas.”
Police say they were investigating allegations that the club was over-serving its customers. They also allege one of the officers was “groped” during the raid, an allegation that witnesses dispute.
The Dallas Voice blog quotes an eyewitness identified only as Alison, who says the police “only arrested men and seemed to be targeting effeminate men.”
CBS 11 News quoted a witness, Raymond Gill, who said he was pulled aside by officers “because of the way I was walking. He said I looked like I was drunk. But … I got to the bar 30 minutes before they got there. I sat down had not got up before police got there. No one saw me walk.”
According to the Dallas Voice, one man has been hospitalized with a brain hemorrhage after being thrown to the ground by police officers. Pictures of the incident have made their way to the Internet, sparking further anger among the gay community.
“Rest assured that neither the people of Fort Worth nor the government of the city of Fort Worth will tolerate discrimination against any of its citizens,” said Joel Burns, a Fort Worth city councilman and Tarrant County’s first openly gay elected official, at a protest against the raid Sunday.
On Sunday, the Cathedral of Hope in Dallas, which bills itself as “the world’s largest lesbian and gay church,” released a statement on the raids:
“After more than a generation of progress, this action shows that there is still much work to be done to ensure that all Americans enjoy ‘equal protection under the law.’ It is tragic that lesbian and gay taxpayers are still abused by the very people who are paid by our taxes,” the statement reads in part.
According to a poll commissioned by the Texas Lyceum Association, 57 percent of Texans support the recognition of civil unions or gay marriages.
This video is from CBS 11 News, broadcast June 28, 2009.
Download video via RawReplay.com
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WOW what a shocker there may be a few drunk people in a bar!
hooray for teas, land of freedom, where an overbearing government does nto interfere with the freedom of the individual…err.. oh wait. that was some other texas.
Bet the klan does a booming business in texas. So full of hate the whole state..These people were in a bar where threy were beaten for intoxication..
Moron, TABC is staffed with Bi lingual HISPANICS in order to do their job at all the frigging Cantina’s in Texas. So if their is a hispanic KKK you may be right. otherwise you are a racist idiot.
TABC just got busted for raping intoxicated females. TABC are thugs. but then again so are the police generally. Tarrant County is a shithole filled with all those snake worshipping christers from hell. They just had a major sting operation with the vice squad b/c a milf was selling “sexual devices” to her friends like a tupperware party. Dil does. are forbidden in the insane puratanical N texas. (where peepshoe porno booths and “massage parlours” run rampant.) the epitome of hypocrisey. This is why George W. Bush lives there!!
Who in the police dept authorised this raid on a gay bar the same day thousands of demonstrators were in town? What a stroke of idiocy!
But then, Texas is not known for those who choose to think things through. Take George W. Bush for example. (Please!)
Looks like Texans should get used to the idea that the rest of us have to live with - That US Citizens have absolutely no say in government, no matter what tap dance the politicians do.
Bidness as usual. (Oh. For oil, “Binness” as usual.) At least Jeff Foxworthy may be able to add a new punchline to the long running “You may be a Redneck if …”
“… You are in a Texas Gay Bar, dressed in Blue with a badge, ‘inspecting’ for drunks.”
-fwiw,
dcm
Hey, this is Texas we’re talking about here. Nothing new. Texas law enforcement has long been staffed by thugs, racists, homophobes and other assorted riff-raff that couldn’t get a job wiping a chimp’s ass in a circus if they didn’t have badges and guns.
As an 11 year old I made the decision to never travel to Texas, it was November 22 1963. A person would have to be a fool to go to Texas.
Time to riot again. Er, but that’s what they want. Dilemma.
No progress has been made, and nothing will change..
UNTIL - the cops leave an event like that on stretchers.
Typical cop horse shit. Say that a guy was walking like he was drunk when he had been sitting the whole time you were there. Claim that a cop was groped. At WHAT time does ANYONE ever being harassed by the cops have ANY opportunity to touch the cops? It AIN’T going to happen. The ONLY person groping a cop is going to be another cop. Cops LIE whenever they think it makes THEM look good and the other person guilty.
This is nothing but harassment in the most backwater state in the country. They kill more people with the death penalty than all the other states combined. They arrest more people for the most ridiculous things and have the gall to talk about being free. As far as I’m concerned, Texas can go ahead and secede any time now, I won’t mind at all. Mexico can take it back, but I doubt they want it anymore. Good riddance.
too many people who are not smart but are arrogant as hell.. that’s America.
You’ll note that the most successful countries in the world are all significantly smaller than America (we’re the 3rd largest behind India and China, and those close to us in size have similar problems). Those successful countries also have MUCH better educational systems in place, and almost all of them have health care that covers _every_ citizen.
Instead of moving forward as a species, we’re regressing to a State of Nature, brought on by greed and power mad morons who control our government (and are positioning themselves to control the entire global financial systems).
You have bigots as leaders who are thinking of their own glory, not doing the job they are paid to do.. Those “complaints” were most likely filed by ignorant church-going homophobes who complain just to try and validate their own existences by having an effect in the world they can see.. it’s that same lack of security in self that causes them to be religious/superstitious.
sad.
Pick up the phone and call the Fort Worth Police Department…817-335-4222 let them know what you think.
LOL!
It’s just Texans, Cops, and Jesus Nutters. If we could just get them out of the closet and stop their self loathing…….But then, they would be normal people, wouldn’t they?
I’m headed to a huge tea bagging on July 4th. I’ll be undercover. I am looking forward to what promises to be the biggest freak show in the history of Oregon. I’ll let you know how it goes!
What self-respecting gay would live in a shithole like Texas?
This doesn’t surprise me, it’s TexASS, after all.
I’m just surprised that “57%” of Texan’s approve of civil unions/gay marriage … that can’t be right.
Texas is an embarrassment to this nation.
That’s some great coverage, but it left out the part where they were all secret gay Iranians shot by the police in cahoots with their Iranian cop brothers and charged $3000 per bullet shot into them. And the outrage on the part of the gay community was a lie, this whole story is just made up, I’ll bet they were issued $3000 tickets for being gay, and that the drinks were all $3000 a piece as well.
Our little devil’s off their meds again.
LOL! That doesn’t even make sense! WTF!
Anyway, sorry to hear about this for those who were harassed and beaten. There is always some jerk enforcer, like those guys beating demonstrators in Iran… all the same all over the world. Who are they? Where do they come from? I don’t know anyone like that. Full of hate and wanting to swing a club at someone’s head… what monstrous parents raised them? What evil society encourages them?
Texas or Iran… it seems to be that religious fundamentalism is the common thread.
This incident occurred in Texas before it has completed its succession from the rest of USA.
Also, in Texas, normal legal standards for busting people can just be thrown out of the door from the start.
That the club was suspected of over-serving customers would normally be an issue you take up with the club management, not the customers…
but then again this is Texas, where gravity doesn’t necessarily take hold everywhere.
Perhaps hassling some over-served customers at a Texas redneck motherfuckers bar would have been a bit to difficult to carry out if the pigs had forgotten to bring their totally necessary modern survival toys, tasers, along for the bust.
I think what is noteworthy is that Fort Worth does have an openly gay elected councilman who assured a protest rally that local government won’t tolerate discrimination against any of its’ citizens.There will no doubt be an investigation of the incident.The achievements of the gay community civil rights movement and now equality movement since Stonewall are breathtaking ,yet this does not mean the end of homophobia in the world anymore than there has been an end to racism or anti semitism etcetera!!Now who would have guessed back then when Dr.King gave his I have a dream speech that we would have a mixed race POTUS in2009?Sure times change and people change,yet there had to be a”movement”to make it happen.Happy gay pride month to the gay community!
Well, I am a gay man who adopted children here in Texas - While people in New Hampshere nor Floridian cannot do. I am a native Texan of Anglo/hispanic/native american ancestry, and my family was here before the Texas Revolution. I understand why some people would just loathe TExas. We are the home of Tom Delay. However, we are also the home of Barbara JOrdan, Molly Ivans, and Ann Richards. As a gay man and a minority, I prefer many parts of TExas, while I totally avoid others. East Texas is a scary place. Austin, the Hill country, the Coast, inner loop of Houston, West Texas, and south Texas are wonderful places. Most people don’t know that most TExans are Catholic, not evangelical nor fundamentalist, so when posters talk about TExas as a “fundie” bastion I don’t understand. The most racism my family ever experienced was in Colorado. Colorado Springs is scary. The most segragated place I ever been to was Long Island. I never saw so many white people. People were actually staring at us.
I stay in TExas for the weather and I just love the laidback atmosphere. I have never really experienced strong homophobia or racism here. That’s my two cents. Ciao
Eltravesio: I know just what you mean, and I’m not even gay. CO Springs is a blight on the whole state of CO, one I wish could be removed and sent packing. The whole area down there is scary as hell. In fact, I am farily convinced it IS hell. Fortunately, I live several hours away from there.
I’m sure there are nice parts of Texas. We just never get to hear anything about them, just the actions of the racist, homophobic and authoritarian scum that live there. I’ve been to and through Texas several times, and have always been impressed by two things. One, that Texas has some of the most beautiful women in the country if not the world in it. Two, Texans in Texas are some of the most hospitable people anywhere, but when they leave Texas are some of the most annoying, rude and thick headed people in the world. I don’t know why that second one is the way it is, but it is.
Sorry that you had such miserable experiences in my state, but judging all of CO by the actions of the armpit is like judging all of Michigan on downtown Detroit. We aren’t all like that.
wjm50, I tell you a little secret. I think that there are hicks, racists, homophobes, and authoritarian types in all states and everywhere. It makes us feel good about ourselves if we can place all the blame on someone else. But, the enlightened person is the one who can honestly see their own racism or sexism. That is a truly enlightened person….Also, I have heard that Boulder is a great town. …And I know what you mean about some rude TExans. Unfortunately, TExas has a lot of “Nuevo Riche” who have money but no decorum…. And TExas isn’t for eveybody. The heat here is brutal for many. It I wasn’t in TExas I would probably live in New Mexico. I like the desert.
Texas? Wrong SPELLING.
Correct spelling: TexASS.
Texas cops just want TO GET A GROPE and get some practice
before becoming some REPUBLICAN Congressman’s
SCREW-PET.