![]() Hays said that although IRS rules for 501(c)(3) organizations allow a limited degree of legislative lobbying, the group long ago decided not to engage in direct lobbying. He points out that under its current status, the group cannot endorse candidates running for public office and must remain as a nonpartisan group. Hays told the Blade that the board’s plans include retaining the organization’s status as a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization that continues its longstanding three-part mission: “safe social activities community service and non-partisan political awareness.” ![]() ![]() This was the basis for us now operating as Equality NoVa.” “Additionally, the 2023 board of directors recognized that the name we operate under needed updating to reflect the entirety of the LGBTQ+ community, not just only gays and lesbians. “The 2023 board of directors wanted to make sure we are operating as we need to ensure coverage for Fairfax County, too,” Hays’ statement says. “We have been going as the Arlington-Alexandria Gay and Lesbian Alliance for roughly 7 years to ensure Alexandria has had representation,” it says. “The organizations in Alexandria (the Alexandria Gay & Lesbian Community Association) and Fairfax County (Equality Fairfax) over the past decade have ceased to operate due to a number of factors, including the inability to sustain active boards,” Hays’ statement says. “Since the organization’s founding in 1981 it has helped to form similar groups in Alexandria and Fairfax County among others,” the statement continues. “This decision was not made in haste, but rather in recognition of where LGBTQ+ organizations stand in Northern Virginia,” according to Hays’ statement released on March 25. The Times and AP report that the jury handed down its not guilty verdict after deliberating for just three hours. The law, similar to laws passed by other states, says juries cannot consider a violent act to be justified by someone who finds out someone else’s sexual orientation or gender identity.Īccording to the Roanoke Times, the judge said the law would have applied in this case, but it did not take effect until after the incident in which Etute assaulted Smith took place and so the law could not be applied retroactively. Prosecutor Jensen called on Circuit Court Judge Mike Fleenor to instruct the jury that the defense could not use a so-called “gay panic defense” on Etute’s behalf because the Virginia General Assembly last year passed a law outlawing the gay and transgender panic defense in criminal trials. ![]() “Who is the real victim here?” the newspaper quoted Turk as telling the jury in his closing arguments. His attorney, Jimmy Turk, told the jury that Smith was a “deceitful and dishonest man” who “defrauded young men for his own sexual gratification,” the Roanoke Times reports. “I felt violated,” Etute testified at the trial, according to the AP and the Roanoke Times “I was just in shock, in disbelief that someone tricked me and lied to me,” the Times quoted Etute as telling the judge and jury. The Associated Press reports that Assistant State’s Attorney Patrick Jensen argued at the trial that the injuries suffered by Smith indicated Etute acted with malice and Smith could not have posed a threat to him after he was initially punched by Etute. Prosecutors presented a witness from the county medical examiner’s office who testified that most of the bones in Smith’s face were broken, he had bleeding and swelling in his brain, and had multiple teeth knocked out. Police discovered a knife under the mattress at the time they found Smith’s badly beaten body on the bedroom floor. He testified at his three-day trial last week that he began punching Smith after Smith appeared to be reaching for a weapon under the mattress of his bed, possibly a gun. The newspaper reports that Etute testified at his trial that a confrontation broke out inside Smith’s apartment after Etute saw that Smith was a man. A Montgomery County, Va., jury on May 27 acquitted a former Virginia Tech football player of second-degree murder for the May 2021 beating death of a gay man who was dressed in women’s clothes when the two men engaged in sex after meeting through the online dating site Tinder.Īt the time of his arrest last year, Isimemen Etute, 19, who was 18 at the time of the incident, told police he acted in self-defense after learning that victim Jerry Paul Smith, 40, tricked him into thinking he was a woman when he allowed Smith to perform oral sex on him at Smith’s Blacksburg, Va., apartment on April 10, 2021.Įtute told police he returned to Smith’s apartment in May of that year to determine whether Smith was a man or a woman, according to the Roanoke Times.
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