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[UPDATE] YouthPride files counterclaim against landlord Inman Park United Methodist Church

The Georgia Voice Editors
Atlanta
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YouthPride is digging in to fight the lawsuit filed against the LGBT youth group by its landlord Inman Park United Methodist Church, which says the LGBT youth group nonprofit owes more than $40,000 in back rent.

A court date is set for March 20 in Fulton Magistrate Court to try to settle the dispute, according to online documents filed with Fulton Magistrate Court. The notice was mailed out to the church on Tuesday, March 13.

Inman Park UMC filed its lawsuit against YouthPride in Fulton Magistrate Court on Feb. 17 including an eviction notice to be served on the organization mandating it leave the premises.

U.S. House leadership appeals decision on federal recognition of gay marriage

The Georgia Voice Editors
National
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DOMA lawsuit

In a ruling legal advocates said “spells doom” for the federal ban on recognizing gay marriage, a district court judge declared the Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional. But Republican leaders in the U.S. House have already announced their intent to appeal the decision.

The ruling, handed down Feb. 22 by Judge Jeffery White of the District Court for the Northern District of California, finds that DOMA violates the equal protection clause of the United States Constitution.

The case, Golinski v. United States Office of Personnel Management, involves Karen Golinski, who sued the Office of Personnel Management after she was denied access to family health benefits for her wife, Amy Cunninghis. The couple was married in California in 2008, before Proposition 8 ended gay marriage in the state.

HIV-positive man who sued city of Atlanta over police job gets new day in court

The Georgia Voice Editors
Atlanta
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The case of a 40-year old man who was denied employment with the Atlanta Police Department over his positive HIV status will return to a U.S. District Court after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit sent the case back to the lower court to resolve unaddressed issues.

The man, identified as by the pseudonym “Richard Roe,” first applied to the APD in early 2006, but was denied employment due to his HIV status. Roe claims the department called him a “direct threat” to the safety of others.

Roe was represented by attorneys with Lambda Legal, a nonprofit group that works on LGBT and HIV issues. Lambda argued the case before the appeals panel on Jan. 25 in Atlanta.

"This is a great victory for Lambda Legal's client who will now get his chance in court to show how the APD's refusal to hire him was discriminatory and illegal," Scott Schoettes, Lambda Legal's HIV project director, said in a press release this afternoon.

"Before the appellate court, the City of Atlanta admitted that there are already HIV-positive police officers serving on the force; now they need to explain why our client should be treated any differently," Schoettes said.

In an unpublished opinion released today, the three-judge appeals court panel found that the district court erred in siding with the city that Roe had not established he is qualified to be a police officer. “Unpublished” means the opinion is not binding precedent, according to the appeals court web site.

Person of the Year: Vandy Beth Glenn

The Georgia Voice Editors
Community
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Vandy Beth Glenn, GA Voice

After a day back at work under the Gold Dome, Vandy Beth Glenn sits down to talk. She pulls her boots off her feet and tucks her legs under her, maneuvering her body into a comfortable position.

“It’s been hard, really hard,” she said of the past four years in her legal fight to get her job back as a legislative editor at the Georgial General Assembly.

Fired in 2007 by then-Legislative Counsel Sewell Brumby for deciding to transition genders on the job, Glenn won her lawsuit against Brumby and the state this month when a three-judge panel of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court’s ruling that Brumby, who retired in August, wrongly fired her. Glenn was represented by Lambda Legal.

Vandy Beth Glenn may soon return to work at Ga. General Assembly

The Georgia Voice Editors
Atlanta
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Vandy Beth Glenn and attorney Greg Nevins

A federal appeals court panel has upheld a lower court ruling that Vandy Beth Glenn was wrongly fired from her job as a legislative editor in the Georgia General Assembly after she informed her employer she planned to transition from male to female.

“The question here is whether discriminating against someone on the basis of his or her gender non-conformity constitutes sex-based discrimination under the Equal Protection Clause. …We hold that it does,” the three-judge panel of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on Dec. 6, just five days after oral arguments were heard in the case.

Judge Rosemary Barkett wrote the opinion for the unanimous panel that included Judge William H. Pryor and Senior Judge Phyllis Kravitch.

More lawsuits filed against city of Atlanta for raid on gay bar

The Georgia Voice Editors
Atlanta
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Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed and Attorney Dan Grossman

Ten patrons of the Atlanta Eagle are suing Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed and 25 police officers in Fulton County Superior Court, arguing their rights were violated during the botched raid on the gay bar. They allege many of the same offenses in the original lawsuit filed in November 2009, shortly after the raid occurred on Sept. 10, 2009.

Eight other men in the bar the night it was raided settled with the city Sept. 8 for an undisclosed amount of money. The Atlanta City Council will have to approve the settlement and at that time the amount will be made public.

Represented by attorneys Dan Grossman and Gerry Weber, the plaintiffs in the new lawsuit accuse the officers of violating the Fourth and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution protecting people from illegal search and seizures. The lawsuit was filed Sept. 8.

HIV-positive man sues Atlanta alleging discrimination

The Georgia Voice Editors
Atlanta
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Lamba Legal's Greg NevinsA 39-year-old man is suing the city of Atlanta after he claims he was denied a job as an Atlanta Police Department officer in 2006 because he is HIV-positive.

Last week, Lambda Legal finished its briefing with the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of “Richard Roe,” the pseudonym being used by the HIV-positive man in legal documents to protect his privacy.

The lawsuit was originally filed in 2006. A lower court ruled in favor of the city because Roe “could not show he was qualified to perform the job because it believed that a police officer with HIV presents a ‘direct threat’ to the health and safety of others,” according to Lambda Legal.