Lane Avenue Shopping Mall Sting
From: David Morse dmorse@infinet.com
October 12, 1995
For the past week the Columbus, Ohio new media have run stories about the arrests at
the Lane Ave. Shopping Mall restroom arrests. On Wednesday (10/11/95), Channel Six New
broke the story during the 6:00 PM News. The story was picked up by the Ohio State
University newspaper, the Lantern, printed the story on the following day.. The media used
the term "homosexual" avoiding the term "gay" and did not link the
story with any rights issues. in the same issue, the OSU paper printed a captioned
photograph of a student gay rights organization rasing a flag, but did not print any story
about the event.
Apparently, sixteen men have been arrested by police since March 1995 for touching
undercover policemen in the restroom. The men included some in prominent positions
including a high ranking OSU employee. The Lantern published the names. In the past year,
the Columbus police have targeted and made arrests of men in parks and restrooms all over
the city. One bookstore was closed for the second time. According to a Columbus attorney,
the police have used every tacit to arrest including entrapment.
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