Sent to Jail for Being Gay?
Jan. 17 -- Matthew Limon was one week past his 18th birthday when he performed oral sex on a younger male teenager in the residential center for developmentally disabled youth where they both lived.
By all accounts, there was no violence or aggression involved. Because the younger teen was not even 15, however, Limon's actions were considered criminal sodomy by the state of Kansas.
Even if Limon had performed sodomy on a girl, he would have been in trouble. But he and his family were shocked to find out just how much trouble he was in. Under Kansas law, Limon's actions earned him a 17-year prison sentence. If he had performed the same sex act on a girl, his sentence would have been about 15 months.
Now, he's in the Ellsworth Correctional Facility and will be jailed until he is 35; once he gets out, he must register as a sex offender.
Limon, who has already served three years of his term, is not challenging whether Kansas has the right to punish older teens for having sex with younger teens, says his lawyer, ACLU staff attorney Tamara Lange. "The unfairness in the Kansas rules is what he's challenging," she said.
Today, the U.S. Supreme Court will decide whether to hear arguments in Limon's case.
The court has already agreed to hear a challenge to a Texas law that hands out stiffer penalties to gays than heterosexuals for committing sodomy. With this case, the court will take another look at its 1986 decision in Bowers vs. Hardwick that said the Constitution did not protect the rights of gays and lesbians to engage in sex in the privacy of their homes.
If the court also agrees to hear the Limon case, the decisions in both cases could amount to the most monumental rulings the high court has issued in the area of gay rights certainly since Bowers.
While rulings in either case could have significant consequences for the legal status of gays and lesbians in the United States, Limon has much more at stake than the plaintiffs in the Texas case.
"Most of us cannot imagine what it's like to be in prison let alone because it's something about our identity," Lange said. "He feels scared and upset. He hasn't had an opportunity to live an adult life, or to go out into the adult world."
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