Study Finds Court Bias Against Gays

The California court system suffers from inequalities in its treatment of lesbians and gay men, according to a six-year study released this week by the Judicial Council of California, a policy-making body for the state’s courts.

The study, the first of its kind in the nation, showed that more than 56% of the 1,225 lesbians and gay men surveyed experienced or observed a negative comment or action in the courts when sexual orientation was made known.

“It’s a wake-up call of how much work needs to be done,” said Jon W. Davidson, supervising attorney for the Western Regional Office of the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund. “It has important consequences, because gays and lesbians are going to use the court system. The courts need to deal with [the inequalities] if they’re committed to open access for all people.”

Superior Court Judge Jerold Krieger, chairman of the council’s sexual orientation subcommittee, said the council will create a committee to deal with the issues and suggested sensitivity training.

Davidson said the findings show a judicial system with ample bias. But Krieger said the laws are prejudiced, not the judges and court employees.

“I can be very fair,” he said. “But I’m still not permitted to do a marriage of a gay couple.”

Information was gathered from five focus groups in 1996, and the data were used for two studies, one on gay and lesbian court users and the other on court employees regardless of their sexual orientation.

The latest study’s results showed that one in five court employee respondents heard “derogatory terms, ridicule, snickering or jokes about gay men or lesbians in open court, with the comments being made most frequently by judges, lawyers or court employees.” The survey included responses from 1,525 court employees.