Defense attorneys aren’t exactly known for their warm and cozy bedside manner, but the particularly nasty past antigay tactics of a Pennsylvania Supreme Court candidate have come back to haunt his current campaign.
In 1988, Claudia Brenner and her girlfriend, Rebecca Wight, were hiking along the Rocky Knob Trail in south-central Pennsylvania, when a deranged gunman opened fire on them, killing Rebecca and injuring Claudia.
The gunman, Stephen Roy Carr, was convicted of first-degree murder and is serving a life prison sentence.
His lawyer in the case was Mike George, who is now running for a seat on the PA Supreme Court.
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While everyone is entitled to a legal defense, George’s tactic was to discredit Brenner and her deceased lover as wild, reckless lesbians who somehow incited the violence upon themselves.
George was banking on the idea that if he could turn the focus to Brenner’s sex life, he could persuade some of the jurors in conservative Adams County to wonder if the couple’s sexuality might have provoked Carr to commit the crime.
In essence, he was attempting to manipulate a “gay panic” to get his client a lighter sentence.
“In a way, we wanted to get the local folks talking more about the lesbianism than the murder,” George himself said in a book interview a decade later.
George asked Brenner questions like whether they were “fondling each other” or “feeling each other” and whether Wight had “her mouth on your genitals.”
Brenner is now an architect living in Ithaca, NY, and is troubled by the prospect of George becoming a state Supreme Court Justice.
Ted Martin, executive director of Equality Pennsylvania, a group that advocates for LGBT rights, feels similarly.
“He’s proven in the past that he is willing to use questionable and very negative tactics that revolve around a person’s sexual orientation to make his case, and I think that’s wrong,” Martin said. “It calls into question his ability to be fair and really understand all the sides.”
“Frankly, what Michael George did to Claudia Brenner is repulsive,” he added.
George, a Republican serving his second 10-year term as an Adams County Common Pleas judge, declined to comment to Philly.com on his role in the case.
But in a 1999 book called The Whole Truth? A Case of Murder on the Appalachian Trail, George said:
“I wanted to get her full story on the record. That meant a full story as to how many times the women were naked and how many times they engaged in lesbian sex. I wanted the graphic details. All of them.
I wanted it to look like these two women were bold with their lesbianism. That they didn’t hide their lesbianism from anybody, including my client. The more sexually reckless the women appeared, the better for Carr.”
George is one of seven candidates running for three seats on the bench.
Rupert Garcia
Nope. Not if I get the position first.
Brian JC Kneeland
Don’t even elect him dog catcher!
John Malin
Get out the tar and feathers! Make sure it’s really hot and don’t miss a spot!
Damon Robbins
Scumbag
Michael J. Stratton
Laura Kay Collins FYI hopefully we will NOT be elected.
Anthony Lower
I saw an ad for his election last night. Not knowing this story, I decided he was an incredibly creepy guy and wrote down his name in my phone so I wouldn’t accidentally vite for him.
1EqualityUSA
Of course.
Luis H. Lopez
You can’t be prejudice and homophobic judges need to follow the law and be fair! He is not!
1EqualityUSA
Luis H. Lopez, tell this to Scalia, Alito, Thomas, and Roberts! This is why we need to make sure a Republican cannot get another justice on the Supreme Court.
Juanjo
I do not care for the homosexual panic defense and I am glad that many [laces it is now outlawed since it is not scientifically valid. That said as a defense attorney I am aware of the fact that all defense attorneys are required to use whatever valid, lawful defenses they can assert in defense of their client. It does not mean one likes the person one is defending or the defense being asserted. It has to be truthful in that the defendant had to have a serious issue with gay people in this case in order to assert the defense but back then there was no science to refute the validity of the defense.
This attorney may be a total scum bag for a variety of reasons. I am not defending his qualifications for being a judge generally but the fact he used a particular defense for a client should not be held against him. he took and oath to defend his clients with all his abilities within the constraints of truth and ethics. The fact we now have science to show this defense is not valid does not condemn him for an action in the 1980s.
MacAdvisor
As a gay man with a long history of activism, I would also use such a defense if I believed it had a reasonable chance of success for my client and something better wasn’t available. The job of a defense attorney is to raise whatever defense will best help his client, not to protect the sensibilities of any particular group.
Moreover, if you were charged with a crime, that is exactly the kind of criminal defense attorney you’d want.
Using a particular defense doesn’t in any way suggest I approve of its moral position, only that it might help my client. To put down this defender for its use shows vast ignorance of how our justice system works and the rolls of its participants.
youarekiddingme
Just FYI…The Defense Attorneys (and Prosecutors) DO NOT take an OATH to tell the TRUTH when trying a case in court…Just be aware.
scotty
makes me ashamed to say i was born in pa
Kevin J Desmond
I see he’s been smoking crack again.
1EqualityUSA
Mike George, homophobia will not grow you a chin.