Criminal Justice

(New York, Tuesday, January 7, 2003) — With the U.S. Supreme Court set to hear arguments in Lambda Legal’s historic case challenging Texas’s “Homosexual Conduct” law this Spring, Lambda Legal today announced plans for town hall meetings and other community presentations in states that still have sodomy laws, which typically criminalize oral and anal sex and are widely used to justify discrimination against lesbians and gay men.

(CHICAGO, May 1, 2001) — Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund has joined forces with the Ashtabula County Public Defender to urge the Ohio Supreme Court to review a case challenging the state’s importuning law, which criminalizes expressions of sexual interest between people of the same sex. Joined in its amicus brief by the Ohio Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the Ohio Human Rights Bar Association, Lambda argues that the law violates guarantees of equal protection and free speech, and should be struck down.

(Washington, Wednesday, March 26, 2003) - The U.S. Supreme Court today hears oral arguments in Lambda Legal's case challenging the constitutionality of Texas's "Homosexual Conduct” law, which criminalizes oral and anal sex by consenting gay couples and is used widely to justify discrimination against lesbians and gay men.

(NEW YORK, April 16, 2001) — Two Houston men who were criminally convicted for having sex in the privacy of their homes are petitioning the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals to review their case after a Court of Appeals ruling upheld the state’s “Homosexual Conduct” law. Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund represents the men and aims to finally bring an end to the state's same-sex only sodomy law.

(NEW YORK, March 30, 2001) — Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund applauds the Netherlands for becoming the first nation to allow same-sex couples to marry, conferring upon those couples full equality and responsibility in the eyes of Dutch marriage law.

(NEW YORK, March 23, 2001) — Ruling Friday that it is unconstitutional for Arkansas to ban consensual sex for adult same-sex couples, a court overturned the state’s anti-gay sodomy law in response to a challenge from seven lesbian and gay state residents, represented by Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund.

The ruling emphasized that government oversteps when it tries to dictate highly intimate, personal decisions and when it singles out one group of people for a rule not applied to others.

(New York, Wednesday, June 4, 2003) - With the U.S. Supreme Court expected to issue its ruling in Lambda Legal’s case challenging Texas’s “Homosexual Conduct” law as early as Monday, local events around the nation are being planned for the day the decision is announced.