Local
Top 10 local news stories for 2023
Hate crimes continue, new queer bars open, and much more
It was another busy year in queer news. Here are the Blade staff picks for the top 10 local news stories of 2023.
#10: Florida prosecutor drops sex with minor charges against Brett Parson
A prosecutor with the Broward County, Fla., State Attorney’s Office on March 13 dropped two charges of unlawful sexual activity with a minor filed against gay former D.C. police lieutenant Brett Parson by Boca Raton, Fla. police in February 2022. Parson’s arrest came shortly after he retired from the police force after 26 years of service, including his role as supervisor of the D.C. police LGBT Liaison Unit.
A memorandum released by the State Attorney’s Office disclosed that prosecutors decided to drop the charges after it became clear that the then 16-year-old boy, who told authorities that his sexual encounter with Parson was consensual, did not want to participate in the prosecution against Parson.
Court records show the youth met Parson after he posted a message on the gay hookup site Growlr and claimed he was 19 years old. The age of sexual consent in Florida is 18, although in several other states, including D.C., the age of consent is 16 and the sexual encounter between Parson and the youth would have been legal in those other states and D.C.
#9: Four new D.C. LGBTQ bars open in 2023
Four new LGBTQ bars opened in D.C. in 2023, bringing the total number of LGBTQ identified bars in the nation’s capital to 19. The first of the four new ones to open was Little Gay Pub at 1100 P St., N.W. near Logan Circle. Its owners and business partners, Dito Sevilla, Dusty Martinez, and Benjamin Gander, have years of experience working at other nearby bars and restaurants, with Martinez and Gander having worked at other gay bars.
The gay nightclub and dance bar Bunker opened a short time later in a large basement space at 2001 14th St., N.W., steps away from the bustling nightlife intersection at 14th and U streets, N.W. Co-owners Zach Renovates and Jesus Quispe for many years produced LGBTQ entertainment events through their company KINETIC Presents. Next to open was Shakers at 2014 9th St., N.W. in the busy 9th and U Street entertainment corridor, which bills itself as a “full spectrum bar, with everything from family nights to ANC meet-and-greets to drag shows.”
And in December Thurst Lounge opened at 2204 14th St., N.W. Owners Brandon Burke and Shaun Mykals describe it as a “space that represents and honors the unique and culturally rich Black gay experience.”
#8: D.C. gov’t holds ‘LGBTQIA Emergency Training’ event
About 25 representatives of local LGBTQ organizations turned out on April 5 for the first in what was expected to be a series of LGBTQIA+ Emergency Preparedness Training sessions offered by the D.C. Homeland Security and Emergency Management Agency and the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs.
Japer Bowles, director of the Office of LGBTQ Affairs, said the initial training session was for nonprofit LGBTQ organizations aimed at helping them take steps to minimize potential threats of violence and to recognize behaviors by individuals who may pose a threat. He said among those attending the April 5 training session were representatives of the D.C. Center for the LGBTQ Community, one of the city’s largest local LGBTQ organizations that is about to move into a new, larger space in a building in the city’s Shaw neighborhood.
#7: Proud Boys target local drag queen story hour events
The far-right group Proud Boys targeted bookstores in Silver Spring, Md. and D.C. in February for protests against the reading of children’s stories by drag performers in an event known as Drag Queen Story Hour. But the group only showed up at the Loyalty Bookstore in Silver Spring. Silver Spring police dispersed the Proud Boys members and counter protesters who supported the drag event after the two groups shouted at each other and reports surfaced that a Proud Boy member assaulted one of the supporters.
One week later, after news surfaced that the Proud Boys planned to hold a protest targeting a Drag Story Hour event at the gay-owned Crazy Aunt Hellen’s restaurant in the Barracks Row section of Capitol Hill in D.C., dozens of supporters turned out in anticipation of the Proud Boys protest. D.C. police, who closed the one-block section of 8th Street, S.E. in anticipation of the protest, said the Proud Boys never showed up.
#6: D.C. mourns loss of two community leaders and a beloved bartender
Many in D.C.’s LGBTQ community in July mourned the unexpected deaths of two gay longtime supporters of LGBTQ causes, Jocko Fajardo and Tarik Pierce, and a beloved bartender, Brooks Davis. Fajardo, a skilled chief, florist, and event planner, and Pierce, an official with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, each died in their homes at the age of 45 in D.C. within one week of each other of undisclosed causes. About 300 people turned out in D.C. ‘s Logan Circle for a candlelight vigil in remembrance of the two men.
Also mourned by a large circle of friends in July was gay bartender Brooks Davis, 29, who died on July 17. Family members asked that the cause of death remain private. Davis worked at the D.C. gay nightclub Bunker after having worked for the luxury retail outlet Louis Vuitton and later operated his own exotic plant business before beginning work as a bartender.
#5: Partner says police botched probe into death of Washington Wizards chef
The longtime domestic partner of Ernest Terrell Newkirk, 55, who worked as chef at D.C.’s Capital One Arena for the Washington Wizards basketball team, expressed strong concern that D.C. police failed to adequately investigate Newkirk’s initially unexplained death.
The partner, Roger Turpin, pointed out that Newkirk was found deceased on a residential street in the 1100 block of 46th Place, S.E., shortly after 3 a.m. on May 28, with his wallet, watch, jewelry, and his car all missing. There were no signs of injury on Newkirk’s body, and it took the D.C. medical examiner four months to complete toxicology tests to finally determine the cause of death, which was acute alcohol intoxication.
D.C. police have said they investigated the case. But Turpin says investigators appear to have declined to follow up on information Turpin provided them to track down someone who may have stolen Newkirk’s car, phone, and credit cards. Turpin says he gave police phone numbers that someone used on Newkirk’s stolen phone to make calls that Turpin obtained from the phone records.
#4: Two area trans lawmakers make history
Two transgender elected officials in the greater D.C. region made history in 2023. Virginia state Del. Danica Roem (D-Manassas) won a decisive victory for a seat in the Virginia state Senate in the state’s Nov. 7 election, becoming the second openly transgender person to win election to a state Senate in the country.
And earlier in the year, Delaware state Sen. Sarah McBride, who became the first transgender person to win a seat in a state Senate in 2020, declared her candidacy for the single Delaware seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Recent polling data show McBride is far ahead of her closest rival in the 2024 Democratic primary. If she wins the primary, as expected, and wins in the November 2024 general election in the solidly Democratic state of Delaware, McBride would become the first transgender person in the U.S. Congress.
#3: Spate of assaults targets LGBT people for possible hate crimes
Two gay bar customers were stabbed in the neck with nonfatal wounds on Aug. 18 outside the Dupont Circle gay bar Fireplace by a woman who D.C. police arrested on a charge of assault with a dangerous weapon and a judge ordered to undergo a mental health examination. That incident followed the arrest by D.C. police in January of three juveniles for four separate armed robberies in the Dupont Circle area near gay bars.
And in August, the Office of the U.S. Attorney for D.C. continued to decline to prosecute two male suspects identified by D.C. police who robbed and pistol whipped a D.C. gay couple in January 2022 after the couple appealed to prosecutors to move ahead with a prosecution. A spokesperson for the U.S. The Attorney’s office said there was insufficient evidence to charge the suspects. Dupont Circle Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner Vincent Slatt, who heads the ANC’s Rainbow Caucus, expressed concern that police were not disclosing sufficient information on whether the growing number of crimes in Dupont Circle and other city neighborhoods are LGBTQ related and whether the assaults against them may be hate crimes.
With this as a backdrop, D.C.’s new police chief, Pamela Smith, told the Blade in an interview she pledges “fair and equal treatment” for the LGBTQ community.
#2: Violence continues against D.C.-area trans women
At least three transgender women were murdered in the D.C. region and a fourth was found dead under suspicious circumstances in 2023, prompting transgender activists to continue their ongoing efforts to address what they consider a nationwide epidemic of anti-trans violence.
The first of the incidents took place Jan. 7 when Jasmine “Star” Mack, 36, was found stabbed to death on the 2000 block of Gallaudet St., N.E. D.C. police say they are actively investigating the case. On March 24, Tasiyah Woodland, 18, was shot to death outside the Paradise bar and grill in Lexington Park, Md. With the help of D.C. police, St. Mary’s County police charged D.C. resident Darryl Parks Jr., 29, with first-degree murder and additional gun related charges in connection with the murder. Police said the shooting followed a dispute between Parks and Mack, but Mack’s family members believe it was a hate crime.
On Oct. 2, 30-year-old trans woman Skylar Harrison Reeves’s partially naked body was found on a park bench in D.C.’s Marvin Gaye Park. Police say there were no obvious injuries found and they are waiting for the medical examiner’s office to determine the cause of death upon completion of toxicology tests. Reeves’s aunt says she believes foul play led to the death. And on Oct. 18, D.C. resident A’nee Roberson, 30, was fatally struck by a car on the 900 block of U Street, N.W., after witnesses say she was assaulted by one or more unidentified suspects and chased into the street in the path of an oncoming car. D.C. police have listed the incident as a homicide, saying the person or persons who assaulted her and forced her into the street committed second-degree murder.
#1: Gay College Park Mayor Patrick Wojahn pleads guilty to child porn charges
A Prince George’s County Circuit Court judge on Nov. 20 sentenced gay former College Park Mayor Patrick Wojahn to 30 years in jail just over three months after Wojahn pleaded guilty to 140 counts of possession or distribution of child pornography.
The sentencing followed news that surfaced in March, which shocked Wojahn’s friends and longtime political supporters, including LGBTQ activists, that he had been arrested after police raided his College Park house and confiscated multiple devices, including computers and cell phones, containing hundreds of images or videos of child pornography depicting pre-pubescent boys.
At the sentencing hearing over a dozen of Wojahn’s friends and family members, including his husband, urged the judge to consider Wojahn’s own statements saying mental health issues were at play in his actions and that he cooperated with the police investigation and deeply apologized for what he did. Under Maryland sentencing rules, Wojahn will be eligible to apply for release on parole after serving 12 and a half years of incarceration.
Honorable mention: Zachary Parker sworn in as new D.C. Council member
Former D.C. school board member Zachary Parker was sworn in on Jan. 2 as the first openly gay member of the D.C. Council since 2015 at an inaugural ceremony in which other elected officials, including D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and six other Council members were also sworn in.
Parker, a Democrat, won election in November 2022 to the Ward 5 Council seat by a wide margin after winning a hotly contested Democratic primary for the Ward 5 seat.
In his inaugural speech after being sworn in as a Council member, Parker said he ran on a vision that “all District residents deserve good and accountable government” and pledged to work to help serve the needs of the city’s diverse residents, including LGBTQ residents.
“With this honor comes the responsibility to address the ridiculously high rates of queer youth homelessness” and “ensure that we’re investing in the people and organizations that are fighting every day for our LGBTQIA plus neighbors,” he said in his speech.
District of Columbia
Faith programming remains key part of Creating Change Conference
‘Faith work is not an easy pill to swallow in LGBTQ spaces’
The National LGBTQ Task Force kicked off the 38th annual Creating Change conference in D.C. this week. This year, as with years past, faith and interfaith programming remains a key part of the conference’s mission and practice.
For some, the presence of faith work at an LGBTQ+ conference may seem antithetical, and Creating Change does not deny the history of harm caused by religious institutions. “We have to be clear that faith work is not an easy pill to swallow in LGBTQ spaces, and they’re no qualms about saying that we acknowledge the pain, trauma, and violence that’s been purported in the name of religion,” Tahil Sharma, Faith Work Director for the National LGBTQ Task Force, said.
In fact, several panels at the conference openly discuss acknowledging, healing from, and resisting religious harm as well as religious nationalism, including one scheduled today titled “Defending Democracy Through Religious Activism: A panel of experts on effective strategies for faith and multi-faith organizing” that features local queer faith activists like Ebony C. Peace, Rob Keithan, and Eric Eldritch who are also involved in the annual DC Pride Interfaith Service.
Another session will hold space for survivors of religious violence, creating “a drop-in space for loving on each other in healing ways, held by Rev. Alba Onofrio and Teo Drake.”
But Sharma and others who organized the Creating Change Conference explained that “a state of antipathy” towards religious communities, especially those that align with queer liberation and solidarity, is counterproductive and denies the rich history of queer religious activism. “It’s time for us to make a call for an approach to LGBTQ+ liberation that uses interfaith literacy as a tool rather than as a weapon against us,” Sharma explained.
Recognizing a local queer faith icon
Along with the panels, fighting religious nationalism and fostering communion with aligned faith activists and communities is at heart of this year’s faith work. As Sharma shared, “the person that we’re honoring this year for the faith award is Rev. Dr. Sofía Betancourt, and Dr. Betancourt is an amazing leader and someone who really stands out in representing UUs but also representing herself unapologetically.”
Based in the Washington, D.C. area, Dr. Betancourt has more than 20 years of experience working as a public minister, seminary professor, scholar, and environment ethicist, and public theologian. Her activism is rooted in her lived identities as a queer, multiracial, AfroLatine first-generation daughter of immigrants from Chile and Panama, and has been a critical voice in advancing the United Universalism towards anti-racist and pluralistic faith work.
Creating a faith-based gathering space
Sharma also said that faith fosters a unique space and practice to encounter grief and joy. For this reason, Sharma wants to “create a space for folks to engage in curiosity, to engage in spiritual fulfillment and grounding but also I think with the times that we’re in to lean into some space to mourn, some space to find hope.” The Many Paths Gathering Space serves this purpose, where visitors can stop for spiritual practice, speak with a Spiritual Care Team member, or just take a sensory break from the bustle of the conference.
This also means uplifting and foregrounding queer religious ephemera with an ofrenda to honor those who have passed, a display of nonbinary Korean American photographer Salgu Wissmath’s exhibition Divine Identity, and the Shower of Stoles, a collection of about 1,500 liturgical stoles and other sacred regalia representing the lives of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people of faith.
The Shower of Stoles
The collection was first started in 1995 by Martha Juillerat and Tammy Lindahl who received eighty stoles that accompanied them and lent them solace as they set aside their ordinations from the Presbyterian Church. The whole collection was first displayed at the 1996 General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in New Mexico. The stoles, according to the Task Force, “quickly became a powerful symbol of the huge loss to the church of gifted leadership.”
Each stole represents the story of a queer person who is active in the life and leadership of their faith community, often sent in by the people themselves but sometimes by a loved one in their honor. About one third of all the stoles are donated anonymously, and over three-quarters of the stoles donated by clergy and full-time church professionals are contributed anonymously.
The collection shows “not just the deep harm that has been caused that does not allow people to meet their vocation when they’re faith leaders, but it also speaks to how there have been queer and trans people in our [faith] communities since the beginning of our traditions, and they continue to serve in forms of leadership,” Sharma explained.
Explicit interfaith work
Along with creating a sacred space for attendees, hosting workshops focused on faith-based action, and recognizing DC’s rich queer religious history, Creating Change is also hosting explicitly faith services, like a Buddhist Meditation, Catholic Mass, Shabbat service, Jummah Prayer Service, and an ecumenical Christian service on Sunday. Creating Change is also welcoming events at the heart of queer religious affirmation, including a Name/Gender/Pronoun/Identity Blessing Ritual and a reading and discussion around queer bibles stories with Rev. Sex (aka Rev. Alba Onofrio).
But along with specific faith-based programs, Sharma explained, “we’re looking to build on something that I helped to introduce, which was the separation of the interfaith ceremony that’s happening this year which is a vigil versus the ecumenical Christian service which is now the only thing that takes place on Sunday morning.”
This includes an Interfaith Empowerment Service this evening and an Interfaith Institute tomorrow, along with “Sing In the Revolution,” an event where folks are invited “to actually engage in the joy and rhythm of resolution and what that looks like,” Sharma said. One of the key activators behind this work is Rev. Eric Eldritch, an ordained Pagan clergy person with Circle Sanctuary and a member of the Pride Interfaith Service planning committee.
Affirming that queer faith work is part of liberation
The goal for this year, Sharma noted, alongside holding space and discussions about faith-based practice and liberation and intentional interfaith work–is to move from thinking about why faith matters in queer liberation spaces to “how is interfaith work the tool for how we’re engaging in our understanding of de-escalation work, digital strategies, navigating a deeper visioning that we need for a better world that requires us to think that we’re not alone in the struggle for mutual abundance and liberation,” Sharma explained.
It may surprise people to learn that faith work has intentionally been part of the National LGBTQ+ Task Force since its beginning in the 1980s. “We can really credit that to some of the former leadership like Urvashi Vaid who actually had a sense of understanding of what role faith plays in the work of liberation and justice,” Sharma said.
“For being someone who wasn’t necessarily religious, she certainly did have a clear understanding of the relationship between those folks who are allies, those folks who stand against us, and then those folks who sit in between–those folks who profess to be of religious and spiritual background and also are unapologetically LGBTQ+,” he continued.
This year’s faith programming builds on this rich history, thinking about “a way to kind of open doors, to not just invite people in but our people to go out into the general scene of the conference” to share how faith-based work is a tool, rather than a hindrance, to queer liberation work.
Virginia
McPike prevails in ‘firehouse’ Dem primary for Va. House of Delegates
Gay Alexandria Council member expected to win 5th District seat
Gay Alexandria City Council member Kirk McPike emerged as the clearcut winner in a hastily called Jan. 20 “firehouse” Democratic primary for a seat in the Virginia House of Delegates representing Alexandria.
McPike, who was one of two gay candidates running in the four-candidate primary, received 1,279 votes or 60.5 percent, far ahead of gay public school teacher Gregory Darrall, a political newcomer who received 60 votes or 3 percent.
Former Alexandria City School Board member Eileen Cassidy Rivera came in second place with 508 votes or 24 percent and Northern Virginia criminal law defense attorney Chris Leibig finished in third place with 265 votes or 12.5 percent.
Each of the candidates expressed strong support for LGBTQ-related issues.
With less than a week’s notice, Democratic Party officials in Alexandria called the primary to select a Democratic nominee to run in the Feb. 10 special election to fill the 5th District House of Delegates seat being vacated by state Del. Elizabeth Bennett-Parker (D-Alexandria).
Bennett-Parker won the Democratic nomination for the Virginia State Senate seat being vacated by gay state Sen. Adam Ebbin (D-Alexandria), who is resigning from his seat to take a position in the administration of Democratic Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger, who took office on Jan. 17.
Bennett-Parker won the nomination for Ebbin’s state Senate seat in yet another firehouse primary on Jan. 13 in which she defeated three other candidates, including gay former state Del. Mark Levine.
McPike, a longtime LGBTQ rights advocate, first won election to the Alexandria City Council in 2021. He has served for 13 years as chief of staff for gay U.S. Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.) and has remained in that position during his tenure on the Alexandria Council. He told the Washington Blade he will continue as chief of staff until next month, when he will resign from that position before taking office in the House of Delegates.
He received the endorsement of Ebbin, U.S. Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.), and the LGBTQ Victory Fund in his race for the 5th District Va. House seat. Being an overwhelmingly Democratic district, virtually all political observers expect McPike to win the Feb. 10 special election.
He will be running against Republican nominee Mason Butler, a local business executive who emerged as the only GOP candidate running for the delegate seat.
“Thank you to the voters of Alexandria for choosing me as the Democratic nominee in the House of Delegates District 5,” McPike said in a statement released shortly after the vote count was completed. “It is an incredible honor to have the opportunity to fight for our community and its values in Richmond,” he said.
“I look forward to continuing to work to address our housing crisis, the challenge of climate change, and the damaging impacts of the Trump administration on the immigrant families, LGBTQ+ Virginians, and federal employees who call Alexandria home,” he stated.
He praised Ebbin for his longstanding support for the LGBTQ community in the Virginia Legislature and added, “If elected to the House of Delegates in the Feb. 10 general election, I will continue to fight to protect the rights and freedoms of LGBTQ+ Virginians from my new position in Richmond.”
Gay candidate Darrall’s campaign website said he is a “proud progressive, lifelong educator, and labor leader running to put people first.” It says he is a political newcomer “with more than 20 years in the classroom” as a teacher who played a key role in the successful unionization of Fairfax Public Schools.
“He is a proud member and staunch supporter of the LGBTQIA+ community,” his website statement said.
District of Columbia
Sold-out crowd turns out for 10th annual Caps Pride night
Gay Men’s Chorus soloist sings National Anthem, draws cheers
A sold-out crowd of 18,347 turned out on Jan. 17 for the 10th annual Pride Night at the Washington Capitals hockey game held at D.C.’s Capital One Arena.
Although LGBTQ Capitals fans were disappointed that the Capitals lost the game to the visiting Florida Panthers, they were treated to a night of celebration with Pride-related videos showing supportive Capitals players and fans projected on the arena’s giant video screen throughout the game.
The game began when Dana Nearing, a member of the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington, sang the National Anthem, drawing applause from all attendees.
The event also served as a fundraiser for the LGBTQ groups Wanda Alston Foundation, which provides housing services to homeless LGBTQ youth, and You Can Play, a nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing LGBTQ inclusion in sports.
“Amid the queer community’s growing love affair with hockey, I’m incredibly honored and proud to see our hometown Capitals continue to celebrate queer joy in such a visible and meaningful way,” said Alston Foundation Executive Director Cesar Toledo.
Capitals spokesperson Nick Grossman said a fundraising raffle held during the game raised $14,760 for You Can Play. He said a fundraising auction for the Alston Foundation organized by the Capitals and its related Monumental Sports and Entertainment Foundation would continue until Thursday, Jan. 22
A statement on the Capitals website says among the items being sold in the auction were autographed Capitals player hockey sticks with rainbow-colored Pride tape wrapped around them, which Capitals players used in their pre-game practice on the ice.
Although several hundred people turned out for a pre-game Pride “block party” at the District E restaurant and bar located next to the Capital One Arena, it couldn’t immediately be determined how many Pride night special tickets for the game were sold.
“While we don’t disclose specific figures related to special ticket offers, we were proud to host our 10th Pride night and celebrate the LGBTQ+ community,” Capitals spokesperson Grossman told the Washington Blade.
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