You know the old saying: What happens at the Wolfe Neck parking area near the Junction & Breakwater Trail stays at the Wolfe Neck parking area near the Junction & Breakwater Trail.
Except the party is over for 12 men who were recently arrested at the Rehoboth Beach, Delaware cruising area.
Related: Giant Christian Scripture Mysteriously Appears At Gay Cruising Park
The men range in age from 49 to 82, and the Washington Blade reports that “they were charged with an assortment of criminal violations, including offensive touching, criminal solicitation, lewdness, indecent exposure and loitering to engage in or solicit sex.”
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We’re a bit torn on some of the charges. If you’re 82 and still frisky enough to be cruising for park trade, we’re not sure if you deserve a court date or a medal.
Police deployed plain-clothes officers to investigate the scene, and promise this won’t be the last bust. So be careful who you’re locking eyes with out there, fellas.
Related: Guards Get Naked And Go Undercover To Prevent Gay Sex In Saunas
“DNREC has received many complaints from the public about this type of activity at the Wolfe Neck location,” the park agency’s statement says. “DNREC’s continuing campaign to prevent public lewdness has made use of both uniformed and plainclothes officers and will continue to do so.”
Under Delaware law, two convictions in a three-year period of certain public sex-related offenses such as indecent exposure could result in someone having to register for life as a sex offender even if he was seeking consensual adult sex.
Sheldon Siegel
This takes me back to the Fens in Boston. Lol
Mark
Just stop cruising these places folks. end of story. A friend of mine got busted by an undercover cop in a park located in KY, he is now a registered sex offender, he lost his job too because they published his picture in the newspaper.
Ladbrook
Ugh. As sympathetic as I might have a been a few decades ago to aging men who cruise parks in this day and age, it seems unnecessary. If you meet a guy at the beach, the grocery store, or the PTA meeting and you want to invite him back to your place for some private fun, then go for it (been there, done that!)… but engaging in sexual activity in a public place does seem to cross the line of societal decency. We don’t really tolerate that from the straight community, so granting a pass to gay men (even older closeted ones) seems a bit hypocritical.
That being said, arresting someone just for “loitering” in a park known for gay hookups seems homophobic and harassing. Unless the men are literally engaged in something (or are exposing themselves to passers-by), then there should be no reason for an arrest. And seriously, is propositioning a stranger actually worthy of a criminal citation? Especially if it doesn’t involve an exchange of money? Again, this shouldn’t be a crime.
I guess these folks have cleaned up all the gang activity, solved all the open rape and burglary cases, and have no domestic violence calls to follow-up on. Right?
Joseph Gentile
Should not be done in public areas but don’t the cops have better thing to do or do they want a blowjob
Luis Miguel Bustamante
Hahahah is Runyon canyon next?
Sweetie Pie
I have little sympathy for cruisers…there are places for sexual activities, saunas, bar backrooms, hotel rooms, or one´s own house
DDstar1me
Ooooooh..no honey! The only thing that I’m going into the woods for is..”A cow as white as milk, a cape as red as blood, hair as yellow as corn, and a slipper as pure as gold,” all before the chime of midnight. If I get all these things, then, I am promised the man of my dreams.
Glücklich
@Ladbrook:
Yes to this 10,000%. Like when Fred Willard was busted for masturbating in a gay XXX movie theater by the L.A. vice squad a few years ago. L.A. vice squad. They must’ve needed some low-hanging fruit reeeaaal bad.
TheBigOne
I’m sure most of us have cruised public places at one time or another, so I am not passing judgement, but it’s not safe to do that, you never know what type of psycho you’re going to run into.
Peter McKinney
It’s dangerous and you know it.
es1226
@Sheldon Siegel: THOSE were fun times! I remember them well
Stefano Gant
Have they heard about grindr?
jwtraveler
You guys are as uptight, prudish and intolerant as the most right-wing Christians! In what way are adult men engaging in consensual sexual activities sex offenders?! Why are police looking to arrest them? This is homophobia and discrimination plain and simple. Even in 2015,not everyone has the freedom and privilege to live out gay lives. There are no legal protections for gay people in 29 states. Gay people still face ostracism from their families, churches and communities. They don’t all have access to community centers and gay bars.
Are the cops out there arresting straight couples screwing in their cars? And with all this concern about “sex offenders”, why isn’t there more focus on the real sex offenders: Men who rape their children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews, child parishioners and students.? What about all those football players and frat boys raping female college students who are defended and protected by their schools and communities?
This is not about protecting children and communities from sex offenders. It’s about criminalizing gay men.
It’s appalling that you guys don’t realize it!
Daggerman
..if heterosexuals realized that it was their condemnation and barbaric treatment back in history of Gays we would have a better understanding of why certain men resort to having sex in public places. So it’s depraved and lurid. I mean where else where they supposed to go?? It was alright for them, they could do what they pleased.
Jacob23
“We’re a bit torn on some of the charges. If you’re 82 and still frisky enough to be cruising for park trade, we’re not sure if you deserve a court date or a medal.”
Another example of how pathetic Dan Tracer is. Dan, you’re one person. You don’t merit the royal “we.” More to the point. it isn’t heroic or amusing that an 82 year old man is so desperate for human touch that he has to risk his safety and his life by seeking out strangers in a park. This is an indictment of gay male subculture as originally constructed in the 1970s, which was hypersexualized, ageist, and lacking in human kindness. That sort of subculture is not one which respects older people; it disposes of them. So you’ve got a bunch of guys age 49-82 wandering around a state park, not to enjoy nature with their husbands and not to get some fresh air with their kids, but to find a stranger’s body to rub against. Thank (metaphorical) God that this subculture is dying out before our eyes.
GayEGO
@Sheldon Siegel: We used to have Queens Row which was the Boston Public Garden area! :>)
GayEGO
@Joseph Gentile: I imagine they want a BJ as they know what is going on in these cruise areas.
GayEGO
@Peter McKinney: Me too! I remember terms like “She’s a dishy queen” and Mary Doogan, or “Are you a tea room queen?” Those were the days! :>)
Bromancer7
@Jacob23: Projecting much??? You have no idea the life of this 82 year old man, and whether or not he’s “desperate for human touch”. Maybe he has a partner and just likes the thrill of cruising in a public place, something he likely had to do in his youth, before there were gay bars and clubs.
And apparently it’s not dying out like you think it is, otherwise there wouldn’t be anyone to arrest.
Geez, talk about judgmental.
EvonCook
@Mark: Thanks Mark, that is really helpful. No, there should be places where guys, men can go and just share the pleasure and excitement and joy of sex. In most of these situations, hetero couples would never be bothered, NEVER solicited and even amusedly watched, but that old phantom of man sex still rankles the phobics, the crazies and the just plain jealous. Face it, we have a prudish, puritan anti-sexual culture. Nor is there any reasonable provision provided for doing these activities where str8s or the would be offended just are told to stay away, as any sensible uninterested people would. I never dreamed of crashing or picketing or highlighting str8 make out locales. Please stop being an equal prude, “Just say ‘No'”: if only our sex acts went away or were suppressed we’d have no problems. Right!
Ogre Magi
yuck, I don’t see what is so fun about having sex outside with all the dirt,insects,thorns,etc
EvonCook
@Sweetie Pie: Actually, these mischief makers and invaders and crusaders infiltrate most of the places you have mentions as reasonable!
EvonCook
@jwtraveler: Thank you so very much for speaking the truth even if others don’t want to hear it or want to be prudes themselves (or maybe faux heterosexual assimilationists).
Bauhaus
@Ogre Magi:
Mostly spontaneous fun. I’ve never let a little dirt, sand, or a few bugs get in the way of sex, ever. I’ve always been circumspect, and don’t go to cruising places, but I’ve had tons of outdoor sex. I mean, I’m a country boy, started experimenting at a young age, first with girls, then boys, usually it was in barns. I’ve gotten ticks and rashes where humans shouldn’t have them; and the rats in those barns!
Merv
We can’t have people loitering in a park, can we? This is ridiculous. It’s a public park, and there is nothing inherently wrong with meeting other people there, even if it’s for sex. There *might* be a problem with actually having sex *in* the park, but I suspect the police don’t really care where the act is carried out. They just want to harass gay people in a way they would never harass straight people for doing the exact same thing.
Jacob23
@Bromancer7: Ya, and maybe he’s so happy and fulfilled that he had to walk through the park just to let people know. lol! BTW, when something is dying, it still exists. Like, for example, when the VCR was dying in the 90s, some people still used them. And then the day came when no one did. That’s what the 1970s-vintage hyper-promiscuous subculture is: the VCR in 1999. Once dominant, fast becoming a joke.
Bromancer7
@Jacob23: And yet there are still no shortages of public places where gay men have sex. I know of at least 2 not far from where I live. Are they dying? I dunno. Maybe. But there is still a lot of activity and it’s going to be a long time before they are dead, so I wouldn’t hold your breath.
Finrod
I see that the Anti-Fun Brigade is out in force, as usual. What is it about Queerty that attracts so many puritanical, judgmental commenters? Having sex in nature seems like about the most, well, natural thing that you can do.
BigG
Cruise online. Apps, websites, craigslist. Its much easier than being arrested. Times have changed. It’s not worth it to risk being a sex offender just for sex.
jwtraveler
@BigG: Having sex in a public cruising spot is a lot safer than going to a stranger’s home or inviting someone to your home who can kill you and disappear without a trace.
Thirty years ago there were porno theaters, bath houses, sex clubs, backroom bookstores and bars where men could meet for sex. Now, even in NYC, most of them have been shut down. There are many fewer options.
Gay rights is not all about gay marriage.
Joey Torrealba
What I thought the cursing thing was just in Movies. WTF dam old timers still get erections ha I don’t think theirs any here in California. But if their is they are very well hidden lol.
Daniel-Reader
So, you get together with friends and video record your intentions to visit the park area and ask men to come back to your place for sex. Not sex then and there – but specifically ask them to come back to your place. When the police get overzealous and arrest you for simply asking men to go back to your place, you sue the city, county, and state for millions of dollars for false arrest, defamation if they publish your picture, and violations of your First Amendment right to Free Speech since it is not illegal to ask another adult to go back to a private place to have sex. Turn it into a money making scheme just like the rightwing churches try to get cops to violate their right to protect and then sue to make money off it.
Chris
I jut met omeone who told me about being threatened to be arrested by police when he was about to walk his dogs in Wilton Manors’ dog park…..which I had never heard about till then. Must be in the air.
Merv
@Daniel-Reader: What you’ve described is soliciting sodomy. And, while engaging in sodomy is legal everywhere in the US, it’s not entirely clear whether *asking* someone to engage in sodomy is legal everywhere. If that sounds ridiculous, that’s because it is. Police love to use this loophole to harass gay people.
Osman Akkurt
There are gay hook-up apps, use those, who still goes cruising in the 21st Century US in the park?
bottom250
Leave us alone and let us have our pleasurable fun. We are all consenting adults.
Maude
Using police officers to entrap can be nothing less than illegal entrapment.
That said, areas in cities or suburbs used for clandestine objectives has been a staple of every society since before societies as we know them today ever even existed.
Indeed, it was the religious zealots that persuaded people to declare ‘UN-natural’ that which is the single most natural act of all humankind, whether it be between two men or two women, or one man and one women….or an orgy if that was your want.
Sex had no limitations except perhaps, bestiality.
More wars have been fought over organized religion, than any other reason known.
IMO, Religion is a right that must be accepted for those who want it, and even religious rules between themselves is fine, but don’t even try to persuade others to abide by your rules. IMO, when you do that, you step outside the Freedom of Religion law, when you use freedom of speech as a cover, you step outside the law as well.
“Leave the rest of the population alone, and they will leave you alone”.
Until you understand that, you are a natural enemy of the society you live in.
Maude
@Merv:
As is the ‘N’ word, “sodomy” is a word that vilifies.
“Sodomy” should be stricken from our lexicon just as was the ‘N’ word.
Maude
Just plain ole ‘fucking’ is less objectionable than ‘sodomy’.
As a matter of fact, I kinda like, ‘fucking’..
Tommy Ogletree
Random sex with random people!!!!????? Um…….no thank you!!!!!
Stache99
@Jacob23: What do you think Grindr and the like are. I’d call them nothing but substitutes. Do you ever tire of being a shithead? Go find a dick to suck already. Damn.
Stache99
@Bromancer7: Yeah, who needs the right wing nutjobs when we’ve got dear ol troll “Jacob” to do the work for them.
Stache99
@Finrod: I wouldn’t advise the park thing but they do have events at resorts on the Russian River of N California where you can have all the sex you want in the great outdoors.
David Gervais
@Jacob23:
” Dan, you’re one person. You don’t merit the royal “we.” ”
There is an editorial ‘we’, so whether it is correctly used or not, you are wrong to restrict ‘we’ to royalty.
Editors writing an opinion piece on behalf of the publication traditionally use ‘we’.
A columnist using it on his own is crossing the line with his editors.
This might be the case here,
David Gervais
Aside from the possibility of entrapment, there is accepted legal precedent of invasion of privacy.
If the exposed activity took place in an area a person had to make an extra effort to reach, then they had a reasonable expectation of privacy.
This varies greatly by jurisdiction, but a good civil rights lawyer can defeat the charges. In a jurisdiction where those types of argument fail, they can at least tie up the police department with court appearances and trash the vice squad’s budget to the point that it becomes a defeat for them anyways.
jwtraveler
@bottom250: Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. I’m with you. Are you available?
Joe Eugene
We had some vista point busts near me years ago. The TV news ran a spot along the lines of “they park here, walk along this walkway, go over the retaining wall, and 50 feet down this path into the trees AND HAVE PUBLIC SEX!!!” I asked my partner at the time and I wonder to this day: what would you have to do to find a little privacy, for crying out loud?
bottom250
@jwtraveler: Hugs sweetheart. I am available for men anytime.
Dave084
Cruising in today’s world may not be necessary anymore but it still can be none the less thrilling. If it’s being done in clandestine private areas leave them the hell alone. Go solve some real crimes. Typical stick up the ass, religiously mind-fucked U.S. attitudes toward sex. And it’s totally outrageous that someone can be made to register as a sex offender for soliciting or engaging in age appropriate consensual sex. One more way fucked-up right-wing blowhards have screwed up this country with their putrid self-righteousness.
Will L
If you really have to hook up, go to the bars. Yes, you may spend a small fortune on a Coke, but it beats getting busted. These venues served a purpose when bars were raided regularly but not anymore. There have always been some who simply get a thrill from tearooms or want under-age trade (that is evil in itself). Since society’s attitudes pushed us underground, we need to cut that out since society is (slowly) changing. The police will not stop entrapment as long as their are enough arrests to warrant it.
nature boy
Hahaha this is how I got my username from a dear friend back in the day…. anyway I feel bad for younger kids that have not had the fun of some of the nations most magical and fun outdoor cruising spots… mostly all gone now but not forgotten!!! If you haven’t tried it you really shouldn’t knock it. I can assure you that grindr, scruff, craigslist etc is a sad pale imitation of actual meatspace cruising. I would much rather see gay men meeting in a park, woods, etc than all individually sitting alone in their rooms staring at a tiny screen. There’s no lying about your age or dick size or using someone else’s photos when you’re face to face in the woods.
And yes, there is a time and a place for this activity and gay men usually are pretty damn careful about it. And yes, you can actually have a LEGAL reasonable expectation of privacy for intimate contact in public spaces in the great outdoors. the issue is when cops specifically target gays and arrest or harass them when they’re actually doing nothing, just for being there, or entrap them by solicitation including sometimes stroking dildos protruding from their pants, etc. This represents just ridiculous hatred of gay men. Sad to hear it is still going on. I hope the arrested men are willing and able to fight it today. Many men in the past committed suicide when arrested in similar circumstances.
jockjack5
Some of the hottest sex I’ve ever had was in my college library men’s room.
I went to a fairly large school and our library was a huge 7-story high-rise. The sixth-floor was comprised mainly of maps and other archival-type stuff and was seldom busy, especially on week-nights. The single men’s room on this floor was a notorious gay-cruising area.
An even cruisier location was the first-floor men’s room in Colvard Hall, the main administration building for the school of nursing. It was a huge restroom and featured either 7 or 8 stalls, separated by solid marble walls with a good 12″ gap at the floor. Between the three middle stall-walls were numerous Glory Holes, impossibly carved painstakingly thru the half-inch thick marble. One of the G-holes was almost 4″ in diameter! It was not unusual to find 4 or 5 college boys in this restroom at the same time, either sucking or fucking. It was super-hot!
This happened back in the 1990’s, but I still have maintained excellent gaydar when entering a men’s room at the mall or even in church.
youarekiddingme
@nature boy:I agree with you totally. One of the charges listed really bothers me: “loitering to engage in or solicit sex”. Either the person was engaging in sex, or they solicited sex or they didn’t!! What the hell kind of trumped up charge is that? The other charges (at least I understand the legal foundation to), but that charge is a bunch of bullshit!
As you said, I hope these guys and any others are careful (and protective of kids and such) but this sounds like a bit of a witch hunt to me. If someone was “climbing around in the bushes” trying to set up and check out s bunch of gay guys then I think that’s going WAY overboard. Hard to tell from the article. I hope those that committed no crime have the ability to fight the charges so that this won’t happen again.
Merv
@youarekiddingme: Unfortunately, the prosecutors can easily use the threat of publicity or possible sex offender status to force someone to plead guilty to a reduced charge, even if the case is flimsy or even fabricated.
youarekiddingme
@Merv: Absolutely! As Nature Boy said, I hope that these guys have the ability fo fight these charges…I hear you about the pressure of publicity and sex offender status. Totally Agree!!
nature boy
@youarekiddingme: I absolutely agree: to be arrested for “loitering to engage in or solicit sex” is complete bullshit. How the heck do you prove that? You can’t, but you can ruin someone’s life in the process.
From the Blade story, a few more relevant details:
“DNREC spokesperson Michael Globetti declined to say whether the men were caught in an area frequented by passersby or in secluded areas out of sight from the public”
From the attorney hired to defend two of the men: “most of the arrests have been made by a young undercover park ranger who poses as someone cruising for sex.” “This is a rookie ranger who got picked for this and I’m not sure he was properly trained.”
If any of you arrested men read this story and can’t afford a proper defense, please set up a gofundme page and I will kick in a few bucks.
If you’re curious to see who is behind this policing, Wayne Kline is also treasurer of the Delaware Police Chiefs Council and pictured here http://depolicechiefscouncil.org/executive-board.html
Current priorities for the Delaware Police Chiefs Council include “developing a rational approach to the issue of racial profiling without compromising public safety” and “preserving basic family values.”
Not that it’s necessarily relevant as it could be apples and oranges, but, I did note in a heterosexual ASSAULT in the park, no charges were filed http://lancasteronline.com/news/local/mccaskey-boy-will-not-be-charged-with-assaulting-female-student/article_048beb9a-ce58-11e4-9ec4-cb57767bb05e.html?mode=jqm
gaym50ish
It is almost never the out, proud gay men who get caught cruising — it’s usually closeted men, and very often men who are married to women. In one mass arrest at a rest stop that I read about years ago, nearly every man who was named and pictured was married.
Merv
@gaym50ish: While that may be true, it’s the difference in enforcement that is troubling. Try to imagine if the police sent a highly attractive young female cop to a beach or park and had her flirt with straight men and then arrest them when they responded, threatening to ruin their lives with prosecution for sex crimes and putting them on the sex offender registry. The outrage from the straight community would be overwhelming. Yet this is exactly what is happening to gay men, and even gay men show a distinct lack of outrage.
Kevin J Desmond
What’s really sad is that I’ve seen straight couples having sex right there in some parks and nothing happened to them, I saw two guys meet and start talking and they get arrested for doing nothing.
Terry Simmons
Why aren’t prostitutes required to register as sex offenders??? Its a double standard and discriminatory.