1. Dominatrix scandal rocks a police department
2. Liberty couple charged in beating
3. Dominatrix acquitted of manslaughter
4. 3 city sex clubs may have swung their last swinger
5. Paxton urges viewers to accept polygamy drama
1. Dominatrix scandal rocks a police department
2. Liberty couple charged in beating
3. Dominatrix acquitted of manslaughter
4. 3 city sex clubs may have swung their last swinger
5. Paxton urges viewers to accept polygamy drama
Dominatrix scandal rocks a police department
by Tim Fleischer
WABC-TV 7Online (New York)
February 3, 2006
A scandal involving a dominatrix rocks a police department in the Westchester County town of Greenburgh — and now several officers are under investigation.
One cop has been suspended, four others reassigned and the street crime unit has been taken off the street, after a dominatrix claims she was the victim of sexual harassment.
The fallout, up to this point, one officer with the street crimes unit has already been suspended without pay. This also comes after stunning allegations of misconduct against a dominatrix.
Greenburgh Police headquaters are stung by allegations of inappropriate conduct against officers by a 31-year-old woman who makes her living in bondage and S&M.
"You cannot justify the inappropriateness in any manner shape or form," said Greenburgh Police Chief John Kapica.
"There was behavior on the part of the police that one would characterize as unprofessional both at the scene and later at the station house," said defense attorney Tony Castro.
The woman — 31-year-old Gina Annenoel Pane sitting in a car in the parking lot of a movie theater was arrested and charged with marijuana use. But after officers spotted what the chief describes as sex toys in the car, an officer allegedly began making comments of a sexual nature.
And then back at police headquarters, after she revealed to officers in a report that she was a dominatrix by profession, she alleges inappropriate behavior continued — some of it caught on video tape.
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To read this entire article, go to: http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=local&id=3874604 To respond, write to: eyewitness.news@abc.com
Liberty couple charged in beating
by Heather Yakin
The Times Herald-Record (New York)
February 2, 2006
Monticello – A Liberty couple held a man captive and beat him so severely that his kidneys shut down, according to an indictment handed up by a Sullivan County grand jury.
Liberty police said Kasseopeia Morris, 18, and Christopher Gonsalves, 18, of 60 Edgar St., claimed that the whole thing was consensual, part of bondage-dominant sado-masochistic play.
Prosecutors say that claim is nonsense.
Police said the victim, a 21-year-old man from Columbus, Ohio, was beaten from head to toe, one of the worst beatings they've ever seen, and at first hospital personnel didn't think he would survive the injuries.
The victim met the couple online in a medieval-themed chat room, and decided to come live with them so he could get away from his parents, said police.
The man told police he knew nothing of the couple's proclivities, and once he got here he essentially became a slave. If he failed to do his chores or follow directions, the couple would beat him with a belt and cane. He knew no one else here, and had nowhere else to go, police said.
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To read this entire article, go to: http://www.recordonline.com/archive/2006/02/03/news-pg_6_story-02-03.html To respond, write to: letters@th-record.com
Dominatrix acquitted of manslaughter
by Raja Mishra
The Boston Globe
January 31, 2006
Professional dominatrix Barbara Asher was acquitted yesterday of involuntary manslaughter in the death of a New Hampshire man who prosecutors said suffered a fatal heart attack while strapped to a bondage rack in her Quincy condominium.
Prosecutors had argued that Asher, 56, did nothing to help Michael Lord, 53, of North Hampton as he died during the July 2000 session, out of fear that calling authorities would have jeopardized her dominatrix business. The prosecutors said she and a boyfriend chopped up Lord's 275-pound body and dumped the parts in a trash bin behind a Chinese restaurant in Augusta, Maine.
Lord's corpse was never found, which produced a rare legal situation: Prosecutors were forced to try Asher for manslaughter without irrefutable proof that a man had died, his body.
The Norfolk Superior Court jury deliberated for eight hours over two days before finding Asher not guilty of involuntary manslaughter and dismemberment.
Page said in an interview yesterday that the lengthy investigation and trial had been an ordeal for Asher. ''She is still in shock. This has been a terrible 5 1/2 years for her," Page said.
Asher's former boyfriend, Miguel S. Ferrer, faced charges as an accessory but fled the country several years ago, returning to his native Argentina, prosecutors said.
Lord's secret life of bondage stunned his family when the case became public in July 2000. Family members expressed disappointment with the verdict yesterday.
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To read this entire article, go to: http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2006/01/31/dominatrix_acquitted_of_manslaughter/ To respond, write to: letter@globe.com
3 city sex clubs may have swung their last swinger:
by Joseph A. Slobodzian
The Philadelphia Inquirer
January 29, 2006
In the last three months, city officials have shuttered all three of Philadelphia's private – but publicly advertised – clubs for couples and singles who enjoy sex, if not love, with a proper stranger.
It began Nov. 13, when Club Kama Sutra – named for the ancient Hindu guide to lovemaking – was closed by the Department of Licenses and Inspections after operating for five years behind blacked-out windows in the former home of Seqor Rattler's Mexican Restaurant at 712 South St.
"I have never seen a problem there," said Jim, of Northeast Philadelphia. He and his wife, Stacie, have been Club Kama Sutra members for three years. "I think this is all about the lifestyle of people."
Officially, lifestyle has nothing to do with it. L&I moved against each of the three establishments, officials say, for "operating a sex club without a permit."
Club Kama Sutra owner Alan Tizer said he'd get a sex-club permit in a minute except for a catch-22: The city doesn't issue them.
"Realistically, I don't think anyone would push to add" sex clubs to the zoning ordinance, said Andrew S. Ross, divisional deputy city solicitor.
Without such a permit, Ross said, businesses like Club Kama Sutra are illegal. Kama Sutra has been been operating under the Seqor Rattler's restaurant permit.
Closed next was Pleasure Garden Club, in a secluded location along the Schuylkill behind Ballbuster's pool hall in Southwest Philadelphia.
And on Jan. 20, strike three: a midnight visit by L&I to the Retreat, a sex club operating in the old Club Tribeca at 2533 Emery St., under an elevated section of I-95 in Port Richmond.
Tizer and his attorney, Kenneth A. Young, are appealing a Jan. 18 decision by the city Zoning Board of Adjustment upholding closure. They also have sued the city in Common Pleas Court, contending officials have violated their members' rights of free expression and association guaranteed by the U.S. and Pennsylvania constitutions.
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To read this entire article, go to: http://www.bradenton.com/mld/bradenton/news/nation/13736507.htm To respond, write to: the author at jsobodzian@phillynews.com or the editors at Inquirer.Letters@phillynews.com
Paxton urges viewers to accept polygamy drama
by staff writer
WTOP-FM (Washington, DC)
January 28, 2006
APOLLO 13 star BILL PAXTON is bracing for an onslaught of criticism as he plays a polygamist in new TV series BIG LOVE.
The actor's character, BILL HENRICKSON, is married to three women, played by JEANNE TRIPPLEHORN, CHLOE SEVIGNY and GINNIFER (corr) GOODWIN, in the new drama and he fears the show is set for controversy.
But Paxton hopes religious Americans will give his new show a chance before passing judgement.
He says, "In a way this show talks about the freedom in this country. Well, how free are we? Are we free to choose who we want to live with? It becomes four people who are married to each other, four people who are adults who decided to form a family unit, and it becomes kind of us against them.
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To read this entire article, go to: http://www.wtopnews.com/index.php?nid=114&sid=682910
To respond, go to: http://www.wtopnews.com/index.php?nid=56&sid=597520