Local
Police expect arrests soon in shooting of gay man
3 incidents of anti-LGBT violence in 2 days said to be unrelated
Assistant Police Chief Peter Newsham (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
A D.C. police official said on Thursday that an investigation into the March 11 shooting of a gay man at a Columbia Heights restaurant, which police listed as a hate crime, is “progressing very well” and an arrest in the case is expected soon.
At a news conference outside police headquarters, Assistant Police Chief Peter Newsham, who heads the department’s Investigational Services Bureau, said the severe beating and robbery of a gay man and an assault that knocked a transgender woman unconscious one day later were unrelated to the shooting incident.
Newsham said the March 12 beating and robbery incident at Georgia Avenue and Irving Street, N.W., in which a 29-year-old gay man was hospitalized with a broken jaw and head injuries, is listed as an anti-gay hate crime. But he said no evidence could be found to classify the March 12 assault against the transgender woman at West Virginia Avenue and Mt. Olivet Road, N.E., as an anti-trans hate crime.
“It’s unclear what the motive was,” he said of the transgender assault, which resulted in the woman being hospitalized, according to a police report.
“It’s unfortunate that we’ve had members of this community that have been the victims,” said Newsham, when asked if the LGBT community was being targeted.
“The only thing I can really point out to people is that they don’t appear to be related. So it doesn’t appear to be a group of folks that’s targeting or a specific group of people that’s targeting this community,” he said.
Police have said the shooting incident, involving a 31-year-old gay male victim, began after the victim and at least three suspects in the case got into an argument that escalated into a physical altercation.
A witness who identified himself as the victim’s cousin said he, the victim and another cousin were sitting at a table at the International House of Pancakes restaurant on 14th Street, N.W. in Columbia Heights when he overheard the suspect and two people seated with him refer to the people sitting at the victim’s table as “faggies.”
The cousin told the Blade the altercation began when the victim got up to pay the restaurant bill and the suspect and the two people with him blocked his path, prompting him to push his way past the three people. Witnesses heard a gunshot during the scuffle that broke out between the parties, and the victim quickly discovered he had been hit, a police report says.
He was taken to a hospital and remains under treatment for what Newsham said was a non-life threatening injury. The cousin said the gunshot wound injured the victim’s liver.
“The investigation into that case is progressing very well at this point in time,” Newsham said at the news conference. “Investigators have been working on it since the incident occurred and we’re hopeful that we’ll be able to bring that matter to closure.”
Asked if any of the incidents were captured by video cameras that police and private businesses often install on utility poles, Newsham said, “We will not be releasing video at this time…We do have video in a couple of the cases but we don’t feel we need any help with the video at this time,” he said. “We’ve identified most of the people that were involved.”
Jeffrey Richardson, director of the Mayor’s Office of GLBT Affairs, who accompanied Newsham at the news conference, said his office was working closely with police officials to combat hate crimes against all groups.
“We begin to think about the broader implications of why these things are happening,” Richardson said. “We continue to work very closely with community groups and to think about what type of outreach we can do to really begin some culture shifting work around some of these issues.”
Richardson’s comments came after Mayor Vincent Gray issued his own statement denouncing the three incidents of violence against members of the LGBT community.
“All crime is horrific and destructive to the fabric of our community, but especially violent behavior that targets people because of their ethnic background, sexual orientation, faith or other identifying characteristics,”Gray said.
“These kinds of crimes are particularly insidious, because they are designed to instill fear in an entire community,” he said. “This cannot and will not stand in the District of Columbia, where all of our residents have the right to walk the streets of our neighborhoods free of fear, regardless of their identities, beliefs or characteristics. The Metropolitan Police Department and I will not rest until the perpetrators of these brutal crimes are arrested, tried and safely locked away.”
Gay D.C. Council member Jim Graham, a Democrat representing Ward 1, where the shooting and beating-robbery took place, said he was closely monitoring the police investigation into the incidents.
“Such crimes clearly will not be tolerated. And we are all agreed on that,” Graham said in a statement. “As to the shooting inside IHOP at 6:30 AM, the video camera footage has been obtained, and police are confident of a closure on this.”
Graham said police officials told him an off-duty D.C. police detective had been eating at the IHOP at the time of the incident and intervened immediately, a development that provides police with an important advantage in their investigation of the incident.
Gay activist Peter Rosenstein, president of the Campaign For All D.C. Families, which advocated for the city’s same-sex marriage law, praised Gray and Graham for denouncing the latest incidents of violence against GLBT people but expressed concern that other elected officials had yet to speak out on the incidents.
“While DC has taken great steps forward in areas such as marriage-equality, we are still seeing too much violence against the LGBT community,” he said. “We must demand that our elected Council members and the mayor speak out and work to educate people to prevent these crimes in the future. The punishment for these crimes needs to be swift and severe and people need to know there will be major repercussions for this senseless violence against our community.”
District of Columbia
Capital Pride board member resigns, alleges failure to address ‘sexual misconduct’
In startling letter, Taylor Chandler says board’s inaction protected ‘sexual predator’
Taylor Lianne Chandler, a member of the Capital Pride Alliance Board of Directors since 2019 who most recently served as the board’s secretary, submitted a letter of resignation on Feb. 24 that alleges the board has failed to address instances of “sexual misconduct” within the Capital Pride organization.
The Washington Blade received a copy of Chandler’s resignation letter one day after she submitted it from an anonymous source. Chandler, who identifies as transgender and intersex, said in an interview that she did not send the letter to the Blade, but she suspected someone associated with Capital Pride, which organizes D.C.’s annual LGBTQ Pride events, “wants it out in the open.”
“It is with a heavy heart, but with absolute clarity, that I submit my resignation from the Capital Pride Alliance Board of Directors effective immediately,” Chandler states in her letter. “I have devoted nearly ten years of my life to this organization,” she wrote, pointing to her initial involvement as a volunteer and later as a producer of events as chair of the organization’s Transgender, Gender Non-Conforming, and Intersex Committee.
“Capital Pride once meant something profound to me – a space of safety, visibility, and community for people who have often been denied all three,” her letter continues. “That is no longer the organization I am part of today.”
“I, along with other board members, brought forward credible concerns regarding sexual misconduct – a pattern of behavior spanning years – to the attention of this board,” Chandler states in the letter. “What followed was not accountability. What followed was retaliation. Rather than addressing the substance of what was reported, officers and fellow board members chose to chastise those of us who came forward.”
The letter adds, “This board has made its priorities clear through its actions: protecting a sexual predator matters more than protecting the people who had the courage to come forward. … I have been targeted, bullied, and made to feel like an outsider for doing what any person of integrity would do – telling the truth.”
In response to a request from the Blade for comment, Anna Jinkerson, who serves as chair of the Capital Pride board, sent the Blade a statement praising Taylor Chandler’s efforts as a Capital Pride volunteer and board member but did not specifically address the issue of alleged sexual misconduct.
“We’re also aware that her resignation letter has been shared with the media and has listed concerns,” Jinkerson said in her statement. “When concerns are brought to CPA, we act quickly and appropriately to address them,” she said.
“As we continue to grow our organization, we’re proactively strengthening the policies and procedures that shape our systems, our infrastructure, and the support we provide to our team and partners,” Jinkerson said in her statement. “We’re doing this because the community’s experience with CPA must always be safe, affirming, empowering, and inclusive,” she added.
In an interview with the Blade, Chandler said she was not the target of the alleged sexual harassment.
She said a Capital Pride investigation identified one individual implicated in a “pattern” of sexual harassment related behavior over a period of time. But she said she was bound by a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) that applies to all board members and she cannot disclose the name of the person implicated in alleged sexual misconduct or those who came forward to complain about it.
“It was one individual, but there was a pattern and a history,” Chandler said, noting that was the extent of what she can disclose.
“And I’ll say this,” she added. “In my opinion, with gay culture sometimes the touchy feely-ness that goes on seems to be like just part of the culture, not necessarily the same as a sexual assault or whatever. But at the same time, if someone does not want those advances and they’re saying no and trying to push you away and trying to avoid you, then it makes it that way regardless of the culture.”
When asked about when the allegations of sexual harassment first surfaced, Chandler said, “In the past year is when the allegation came forward from one individual. But in the course of this all happening, other individuals came forward and talked about instances – several which showed a pattern.”
Chandler’s resignation comes about five months after Capital Pride Alliance announced in a statement released in October 2025 that its then board president, Ashley Smith, resigned from his position on Oct. 18 after Capital Pride became aware of a “claim” regarding Smith. The statement said the group retained an independent firm to investigate the matter, but it released no further details since that time. Smith has declined to comment on the matter.
When asked by the Blade if the Smith resignation could be linked in some way to allegations of sexual misconduct, Chandler said, “I can’t make a comment one way or the other on that.”
Chandler’s resignation and allegations come after Capital Pride Alliance has been credited with playing the lead role in organizing the World Pride celebration hosted by D.C. in which dozens of LGBTQ-related Pride events were held from May through June of 2025.
The letter of resignation also came just days before Capital Pride Alliance’s annual “Reveal” event scheduled for Feb. 26 at the Hamilton Hotel in which the theme for D.C.’s June 2026 LGBTQ Pride events was to be announced along with other Pride plans.
District of Columbia
Capital Stonewall Democrats elect new leaders
LGBTQ political group set to celebrate 50th anniversary
Longtime Democratic Party activists Stevie McCarty and Brad Howard won election last week as president and vice president for administration for the Capital Stonewall Democrats, D.C.’s largest local LGBTQ political organization.
In a Feb. 24 announcement, the group said McCarty and Howard, both of whom are elected DC Advisory Neighborhood Commissioners, ran in a special Capital Stonewall Democrats election to fill the two leadership positions that became vacant when the officers they replaced resigned.
Outgoing President Howard Garrett, who McCarty has replaced, told the Washington Blade he resigned after taking on a new position as chair of the city’s Ward 1 Democratic Committee. The Capital Stonewall Democrats announcement didn’t say who Howard replaced as vice president for administration.
The group’s website shows its other officers include Elizabeth Mitchell as Vice President for Legislative and Political Affairs, and Monica Nemeth as Treasurer. The officer position of secretary is vacant, the website shows.
“As we look toward 2026, the stakes for D.C. and for LGBTQ+ communities have never been clearer,” the group’s statement announcing McCarty and Howard’s election says. “Our 50th anniversary celebration on March 20 and the launch of our D.C. LGBTQ+ Voter’s Guide mark the beginning of a major year for endorsements, organizing, and coalition building,” the statement says.
McCarty said among the organization’s major endeavors will be holding virtual endorsement forums where candidates running for D.C. mayor and the Council will appear and seek the group’s endorsement.
Founded in 1976 as the Gertrude Stein Democratic Club, the organization’s members voted in 2021 to change its name to Capital Stonewall Democrats. McCarty said the 50th anniversary celebration on March 20, in which D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and members of the D.C. Council are expected to attend, will be held at the PEPCO Gallery meeting center at 702 8th St., N.W.
Virginia
Va. activists preparing campaign in support of repealing marriage amendment
Referendum about ‘dignity and equal protection under the law’
Virginia voters in November will vote on whether to repeal their state’s constitutional amendment that defines marriage as between a man and a woman.
Democratic Gov. Abigail Spanberger on Feb. 6 signed House Bill 612 into law. It facilitates a referendum for voters to approve the repeal of the 2006 Marshall-Newman Amendment. Although the U.S. Supreme Court’s Obergefell ruling extended marriage rights to same-sex couples across the country in 2014, codifying marriage equality in Virginia’s constitution would protect it in the state in case the decision is overturned.
Maryland voters in 2012 approved Question 6, which upheld the state’s marriage equality law, by a 52-48 percent margin. Same-sex marriage became legal in Maryland on Jan. 1, 2013.
LGBTQ advocacy groups and organizations that oppose marriage equality mounted political campaigns ahead of the referendum.
Equality Virginia has been involved in advancing LGBTQ rights in Virginia since 1989.
Equality Virginia is working under its 501c3 designation in conjunction with Equality Virginia Advocates, which operates under a 501c4 designation, to plan campaigns in support of repealing the Marshall-Newman Amendment.
The two main campaigns on which Equality Virginia will be focused are education and voter mobilization. Reed Williams, the group’s director of digital engagement and narrative, spoke with the Washington Blade about Equality Virginia’s plans ahead of the referendum.
Williams said an organization for a “statewide public education campaign” is currently underway. Williams told the Blade its goal will be “to ensure voters understand what this amendment does and why updating Virginia’s constitution matters for families across the commonwealth.”
The organization is also working on a “robust media and voter mobilization campaign to identify and turn out voters” to repeal Marshall-Newman Amendment. Equality Virginia plans to work with the community members to guarantee voters are getting clear and accurate information regarding the meaning of this vote and its effect on the Virginia LGBTQ community.
“We believe Virginia voters are ready to bring our constitution in line with both the law and the values of fairness and freedom that define our commonwealth,” said Equality Virginia Executive Director Narissa Rahaman. “This referendum is about ensuring loving, committed couples and their families are treated with dignity and equal protection under the law.”
The Human Rights Campaign has also worked closely with Equality Virginia.
“It’s time to get rid of outdated, unconstitutional language and ensure that same sex couples are protected in Virginia,” HRC President Kelley Robinson told the Blade in a statement.
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