The handsome unrver p s. Is he entrappg gay men or cleang up a park? - Los Angel Tim

Contents:

• AS A GAY OFFICER I SAW HOW HOMOPHOBIC THE POLICE ARE
• WE WENT TO A CONVENTN FOR GAY POLICE OFFICERS BERL
• THE HANDSOME UNRVER P S. IS HE ENTRAPPG GAY MEN OR CLEANG UP A PARK?
• MEN LURED TO “HOE OF HORRORS” ON GAY DATG APP “GRDR”

AS A GAY OFFICER I SAW HOW HOMOPHOBIC THE POLICE ARE

In a secret document my chief supertennt wrote that he had nsired movg me bee of “ncerns over victimisatn rultg om PC Maxwell’s sexual orientatn” many straight ps, beg gay was seen as unnatural. I moved statns and ntued to police other gay men unr outdated laws, wh me and my lleagu often lookg for gay men on the nal towpath we uld punish for sex acts.

Senrs officers directed to do this bee, they said, the men were g a public when I thk about the se of Stephen Port – who was last week nvicted of murrg four young gay men, whose killgs tectiv failed to lk spe obv clu – the notn of stutnalised homophobia is at the foreont of my md. A uple of years after I joed the force the Labour ernment repealed outdated homophobic laws on gross cency and buggery. However, though people knew they uld no longer outwardly e homophobic language the workplace, they found other ways to exprs their disda and prejudice.

WE WENT TO A CONVENTN FOR GAY POLICE OFFICERS BERL

An appeal judge upheld my this month a gay man, David Cary, won pensatn om the Met after a ne-year battle over s failure to vtigate homophobic abe claims agast him.

THE HANDSOME UNRVER P S. IS HE ENTRAPPG GAY MEN OR CLEANG UP A PARK?

In rponse to this, cg my own se agast the force, the Met said: “The way the anisatn als wh homophobic crime and our ternal practic and polici have changed dramatilly sce 2013.

The system, riddled wh stutnal homophobia as is, needs to be alt I challenged homophobia the Met, not a sgle gay officer or LGBT anisatn stood alongsi me.

But the unrver operatn, which was sharply cricized recently by a judge, also exemplifi a ntroversial, age-old police tactic that many of California’s largt law enforcement agenci have quietly abandoned recent years amid mountg cricism and changg sexual the most-read stori this hour >>In Los Angel, Long Beach and other areas where unrver lewd nduct stgs endure, police fend them as an important tool for tchg people who are vlatg the law and for terrg others om tryg to have sex parks and other public areas ed by fai and activists do not ndone public sex but have long nmned the bts as a form of entrapment, sayg they unfairly sgle out gay men, wh sometim vastatg nsequenc. But recent years, crics of the stgs have gaed tractn as public attus about homosexualy and gay rights have shifted. “Nobody is gog to fend lewd nduct, but there is a qualative difference between sexual predators and people who engage boorish behavr, ” said Los Angel County Asssor Jefey Prang, who is gay and a former special assistant the Sheriff’s Department who worked wh s LGBT advisory uncil.

MEN LURED TO “HOE OF HORRORS” ON GAY DATG APP “GRDR”

Last month, a Los Angel County judge threw out the charg one se stemmg om Long Beach’s 2014 operatn, sayg police were discrimatg agast gay law enforcement agenci have stopped rponse to lawsus or after polil backlash.

While lewd nduct plats have dropped dramatilly recent years, Neiman said stgs have been ed to shut down persistent hotspots for gay cisg and lewd acts 11 tim sce 2014. “You still have to enforce the law when you get plats, ” he e of unrver ps to target gay men Southern California stretch back to the early 20th century, when gay sex was illegal, said Lillian Farman, a historian and thor of “Gay L. Brown, “vice specialists” who loered public rtrooms and other areas while rryg out so-lled “pury mpaigns” aimed at gay men Long Beach and Los Angel, Farman wrote, addg that their methods served as a mol for stgs throughout Southern pair had no prr police trag but were given police badg both ci.