Just got off the phone with Todd Camp who was at the Rainbow Lounge last night when the police came in.
From what he said, it appears police were there arresting people who appeared to have had too much to drink. Todd said that although he saw no one resisting the police, the officers were quite rough in the way they handled people, and that he saw several people shoved rather violently to the ground and handcuffed (with the plastic zip-tie handcuffs).
More as I hear of it.
I have pictures to prove it
Quick correction, none of the arrestees appeared to be drunk. This looked like random harassment, plain and simple. It’s sad that in this day and age, on the anniversary of one of the most important days in gay rights history that the Fort Worth and State police would choose to attack gays in such an aggressive and unjustified manner. I do not think that this is a poor reflection on the city itself. We just had our most successful gay and lesbian film festival ever. We’re proud of our first openly gay city councilman (whose district, incidentally, the Rainbow Lounge resides). And I’m also proud that in the next few weeks, we will shine a very bright light on this unfortunate incident and see that it never happens again.
Hey Chuck, I’d love to see those. Can you e-mail me at todd@qcinema.org?
Thanks.
Todd:
The bar is not in Joel Burns’ district. I got an e-mail saying he has talked to Chief Halstead and is expecting a report very soon.
Thanks, Tammye. I’ll correct that on previous posts elsewhere.
So, unless there is some weirded-out law in Texas that ALLOWS the cops to go into bars and arrest people who are drunk, presumably a preemptive strike against drunk driving then I hope to see someone suing the hell out of that police department. There are asshole cops all over who have fun rousting people just because they are GLBT. We all know it, yet no one ever says it. That’s a damned shame.
hey guys we are employees of the rainbow lounge. the police where there last night and came into speak with us after closing . We were told that we were the third they had been in last night, one being a mixed club and the other a latino club. The officer took the time to thank us for doing such a wonderful job and told us that we had a “fun” club. He made it clear that it had nothing to do with us being an alternative club and almost everyone that was detained was let go except for two. Please continue coming to the rainbow lounge and dont miss the EYES OF TEXAS Ms. Whitney Paige’s full cast show tonight starting at 9. Thank you guys hope to see you there
Well thank you “Rainbow Lounge Staff” for that self-serving commercial break. No comment on how your patrons were treated last night? All is well….unless all your customers are at the courthouse protesting instead of buying drinks and watching the cast show tonight I suppose. Good grief…..
So they targeted a, “mixed club, gay club, and latino club”. Anyone see a problem with the clubs being identified by their makeup or lack of straight white club?
Why are police permitted to enter bars where people are drinking? Is it illegal to be intoxicated? If yes, then why are the bars continuing to serve the customers? Sounds like the bars are just as much guilty and should be penalized.
Sounds like an issue for the ACLU and those patrons should sue the bar for continuing to serve drinks and not cutting them off. It’s the bars responsiblity to know when customers are too intoxicated to drink.
“driving while black” has an analogous term: “Gay In Texas.” (GIT)
To donate to a fund for Chad Gibson, walk into any Frost Bank location in Texas and ask to make a donation to Q Cinema for the benefit of Chad Gibson (the donation is through Q Cinema in order to be tax deductible). The account number is 608439230. Ability to make online donations coming soon.
David @ 5:22 said:
Sounds like an issue for the ACLU and those patrons should sue the bar for continuing to serve drinks and not cutting them off. It’s the bars responsiblity to know when customers are too intoxicated to drink.
—
good point… here’s another one. If they dragged people out who were supposedly intoxicated, why wasn’t the bar cited? they came back later on and thanked the staff (as Rainbow Lounge Staff said)??
which law were they enforcing again?? they arrested people and let all but two go ‘Rainbow Lounge Staff’ said… why wasn’t the bar cited for serving intoxicated patrons? they were THANKED for being cooperative?!? what?!?!
oh, one other thing… I’ve been reading accounts of this on the web.
the police statement says ““An extremely intoxicated patron made sexually explicit movements toward the police supervisor. One person was arrested for public intoxication. A second intoxicated individual was arrested for public intoxication after making sexually explicit movements towards another officer, and a third person assaulted a TABC agent by grabbing his groin. That man was escorted outside and arrested for public intoxication, but was released to paramedics because of his extreme intoxication and the fact that he was vomiting repeatedly. While some officers were outside dealing with the vomiting suspect, another officer inside requested assistance in handling an intoxicated patron who was resisting arrest, and that this person was placed on the ground to control and apprehend him.”
got that? he was supposedly resisting arrest and WASN’T the person who ‘assaulted’ the TABC officer… then I read this:
But a Fort Worth police spokesman told me Gibson was injured outside, when he fell and struck his head because he was so drunk.
“He was the one that groped the TABC agent,” said Sgt. Pedro Criado. “He was injured by falling and hitting his head.”
When I asked Sgt. Criado how he identified Gibson as the “groper,” he said he was reading from a police report filed by cops on the scene. I asked for further details, but he said I’d have to file a Freedom of Information request.
https://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/localnews/stories/DN-floyd_30met.ART0.State.Edition2.4bb1df1.html
so… he was supposedly the ‘groper’… unless you read the official statement from the police, which says something completely different. which is it? how many people were arrested? people were projectile vomiting? huh??
sounds like a case of police brutality, and the Cover Your Ass that comes along with it.
Lawd
This is real!
And these people don’t mind putting this shit in print!
*blank stare*
Fort Worth Police Chief: That Faggot Had It Coming
Posted by Dan Savage on Tue, Jun 30, 2009 at 4:18 PM
Most residents of Fort Worth have never even seen the inside of a gay bar. Fort Worth’s police chief Jeff Halstead is counting on that fact—counting on the average person’s ignorance about gay bars and certain stereotypes about gay men—to get a half a dozen Forth Worth police officers off the hook for conducting a violent raid on a Forth Worth gay bar, the Rainbow Lounge, late last Saturday night. Seven men were arrested during the raid, which took place on the 40th anniversary of the raid on the Stonewall Inn that kick-started the modern gay rights movement, and one of those men—Chad Gibson—remains in intensive care with a brain injury. Gibson may not survive.
The officers who raided the Rainbow Lounge claim that the men in the bar made “advances” on them—and Forth Worth’s police chief is backing them up:
Monday, police chief Jeff Halstead said the officers’ actions are being investigated. However, he also said that officers that entered the bar during the scheduled inspection were touched inappropriately.
“You’re touched and advanced in certain ways by people inside the bar, that’s offensive,” he said. “I’m happy with the restraint used when they were contacted like that.”
Allow me to translate the chief’s comments: “Them faggots in that thar bar touched mah officers and now they’re complainin’ about some rough stuff and one little ol’ faggot with a brain injury? Those perverts should be grateful they’re alive.”
This is a classic example of the Gay Panic Defense. In the very recent past all a straight man who brutally murdered a gay man had to say was, “He made a pass at me!”, and the jury would ignore the evidence and let the murderer off. The Gay Panic Defense doesn’t fly in many courts of law these days but it still has currency in the court of public opinion. And the chief of police in Forth Worth, a major U.S. city, is attempting to use the Gay Panic Defense to convince the citizens of Fort Worth to ignore the evidence—to ignore photographic evidence and credible eyewitness accounts—and let his officers off.
And you’ll never guess who the police are accusing of being the groper: Chad Gibson, the one man arrested at the Rainbow Lounge who can’t defend himself and may never be able to give his side of the story. But another person at the bar witnessed Gibson’s arrest:
“They were hyped up. They were loaded for bear,” said Todd Camp, a veteran journalist who was there celebrating his birthday with friends. “They were just randomly grabbing people, telling them they were drunk.”
Camp told me he has been in bars during TABC/police “checks” before, “and it was never anything like this.” Usually, he said, officers discreetly walk through, looking for anybody who has had too much. This was different. “They were shoving patrons,” Camp said, “asking, ‘How much have you had to drink?'”
…
“[Gibson] was taken down hard,” said Camp, with “four or five” officers wrestling him to the floor inside the club. Cellphone photos shot by patrons and posted to blogs show a person being held facedown by officers in a short hallway inside the club, then show a dent in the wall where his head was apparently banged.
The police claim that Gibson wasn’t injured when those four or five cops slammed him to the floor of the bar, but after his arrest, when, drunk and handcuffed, Gibson somehow fell and hit his head on the pavement outside the bar.
All of this is bullshit.
I’ve been in a million gay bars. I’ve been in gay bars on multiple occasions when the police came in to check everyone’s IDs and make sure no minors were being served. Gay men don’t grope police officers when they enter gay bars. I find it inconceivable that the gay men drinking in the Rainbow Lounge in Fort Worth responded to a raid by attempting to grope the police officers. This “they groped us!” shit is a lie. As the owner of the bar, J.R. Schrock, put it at the protest the night after the raid:
“The groping of the police officer—really? We’re gay, but we’re not dumb,” Schrock said to the crowd that gathered at the bar Sunday afternoon. “That is a lie, and I am appalled by it.”
Jeff Halstead can’t be allowed to use the Gay Panic Defense. His officers weren’t groped, no one was “touched and advanced.” Homophobic cops raided a gay bar, roughed up the patrons, and a young man is in the hospital and may die.
Some will say that this was just an ill-timed raid on a gay bar in Texas, of all places, one that got out of control. So what’s the big deal? But this is exactly the kind of state-sponsored violence that gays and lesbians fought back against at Stonewall 40 years ago. Gay men all over the country are going to have to speak up and defend the patrons of the Rainbow Lounge. We can’t allow the chief of police in Fort Worth to use the Gay Panic Defense or exploit stereotypes about gay men—so sexually reckless that they can’t even keep their hands off cops during a raid!—to get away with violating the civil rights of gay men in Fort Worth or murdering Chad Gibson.
UPDATE: More on Chad Gibson’s condition:
ac33/1246404201-gibson.jpgChad Gibson, the 26-year-old Fort Worth resident who wound up in John Peter Smith Hospital in the intensive care unit after a law enforcement raid on a gay bar over the weekend, remains in danger with a blood clot on his brain. Dallas Voice senior editor Tammye Nash reports on the newspaper’s blog, Instant Tea, that Gibson’s sister, Kristy Morgan, told her a CAT scan had revealed the blood clot has quit growing, but it is still considered a life-threatening situation. Until the clot dissolves, there is a danger that the clot could break off and cause severe brain damage or death. A rupture of the clot could also start bleeding again.
The blood clot could take from six months to two years to dissolve, according to the update. Gibson, shown in a picture from facebook.com, will likely remain in the hospital for the rest of the week and will be referred to a neurosurgeon for follow-up treatment. Surgery is reportedly not being considered at this time.
Discussion is under way about the establishment of a medical fund to assist Gibson. His hospital bill will undoubtedly be enormous, and it is unlikely that he will ever recover any of those medical expenses from the City of Fort Worth. Police officers and other government employees are protected by state law from liability in any legal action that arises in connection with the performance of their official duties, unless they are involved in misconduct or broke laws.
UPDATE 2: Someone needs to put this follow-up question to Fort Worth’s police chief:
If Chad Gibson—the 160-pound, 26-year-old gay man that it took five of your officers to subdue—groped one of your officers, and if it was Gibson’s lewd action that caused your officers to go absolutely apeshit, then surely Gibson—who is in an intensive care unit and may not survive his injuries—was charged with assault, right?
Wrong:
Officers then went to the Rainbow Lounge, which had opened about a week ago. They encountered two drunk people who made “sexually explicit movements” toward officers and another who grabbed a TABC agent’s groin, according to the police report.
No one was arrested for assault but about half a dozen people were arrested on charges of public intoxication, according to police records. Police Chief Jeff Halstead said Gibson was the patron who grabbed at the agent’s groin.
So… Chad Gibson sexually assaulted a Fort Worth police officer and, according to the Fort Worth’s chief of police, Gibson’s assault not only prompted but justified the actions of his officers at the Rainbow Room, but… Gibson wasn’t charged with assault.
Can someone please ask the chief of police to explain how that works?
UPDATE 3: Via Slog commenter jasonzenobia: The Fort Worth Police Department’s email address is fwpdweb@fortworthpd.com and the number for FWPD’s internal affairs office is 817.392.4270. That’s the number to call to report officer misconduct. Joel Burns is the openly gay member of the Fort Worth city council and he’s been all over this. You can reach him at his email is Joel.Burns@fortworthgov.org.
I posted this information here because EVERY GAY PERSON IN FORT WORTH NEEDS TO MARCH!
I saw a picture on the news that showed two cops on top of someone in the club. They had on tan with “State Police ” on the back. Not Fort Worth police.. Anyone know how much the Fort Worth police had to do with this raid? I’ve never seen people in a club get arrested for being drunk. In 1995 Dallas had raids in gay clubs but they would trick people. They ask for you’re ID then ask you to follow them outside, once outside they would arrest you for P.I. So did the law change for P.I.?
Just in.. Fort Worth police were just pulled from assisting the TABC.
Next time the TABC come in the club be sure to use your cams and picture phones.
By the way, didn’t the club have security cams?
Anyone who witnessed employee misconduct is asked to contact Lt. Andy Pena, Acting Director of the Office of Professional Responsibility, at opr@tabc.state.tx.us or call 512-206-3405. Information about how to file a complaint against a TABC employee, and about agency policy on employee investigations, can be found on TABC’s website at http://www.tabc.state.tx.us.