
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, September 9, 1993                   TAG: 9309090232
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND                                LENGTH: Medium

GAY ACTIVISTS OUTRAGED

Gay-rights advocates said Wednesday they were incensed by a judge's comment that a lesbian mother seeking custody of her son was immoral, but a spokeswoman for a conservative group said the judge showed courage.

Henrico County Circuit Judge Buford Parsons Jr. awarded custody of 2-year-old Tyler Doustou to his maternal grandmother, Kay Bottoms. He said the child's mother, Sharon Bottoms, 23, was unfit because of her openly lesbian relationship.

"He had overwhelming evidence that being gay and lesbian in this society is not aberrant behavior, yet he chose to make his remark about it being immoral," said Kent Willis, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union in Virginia. "That is dismaying."

A psychologist who has studied children of gays and lesbians testified that those children suffer no ill effects from growing up in a homosexual environment.

"There is not one shred of evidence to suggest that this woman in particular, or gay and lesbian people in general, are not and cannot be fit, loving parents," said Rick Garcia, director of the Chicago-based Catholic Advocates for Lesbian and Gay Rights.

"Judge Parsons' ruling violates the family unit. The ruling elevates bigotry, ignorance and hatefulness and denigrates a loving, life-giving relationship between a parent and child. He should be ashamed," Garcia said.

But Anne Kincaid of the Family Foundation, a conservative Virginia group, praised Parsons' ruling.

"This man has really stepped out and courageously said there's a place where you draw the line in protecting this child emotionally," Kincaid said. "What a shame that there is such a knee-jerk reaction to the word `moral.' "

Beatrice Dohrn, legal director for Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund Inc. in New York, called the decision "outrageous." Lambda is a national legal organization and civil-rights group for gay rights.

"This is the regular old homophobic, and extremely ingrained, notion that gays and lesbians aren't safe to have around children," she said of Parson's ruling.

Parsons pointed out that oral sex is a felony in Virginia. Gay-rights activists noted that homosexuals do not have a monopoly on that sexual practice.

"I think that points out how homophobic this decision is," Dohrn said. "I'd bet my bottom dollar the judge has never used that as a basis for a ruling in a custody case involving heterosexuals.

Liz Hendrickson, executive director of the National Center for Gay and Lesbian Rights in San Francisco, said many states have repealed similar laws. But she said she is not surprised that conservative Virginia has not followed suit, considering that it was the last state to prosecute an interracial marriage - in 1967.

Virginia "is one of the last bastions, legally speaking, of institutionalized prejudice," Hendrickson said.

by CNB