Supporters Hail Coroner As Hero At Rally Amend Unrepentent About Anti-Gay Remarks; Supporters Urge Him To Run For Mayor Or Governor
About 360 people welcomed Coroner Dexter Amend as a hero Sunday for maintaining that sodomy is wrong and that “the homosexual lifestyle” contributed to a 9-year-old girl’s death.
Amend spoke publicly for the first time since he told the media two weeks ago that gays should be condemned for destroying lives. He had called gays “abnormal” and “animalistic.”
Supporters in their Sunday best huddled around the Spokane county coroner, a green card table stacked with petitions and a microphone that didn’t work. Speakers had to shout to be heard by the crowd outside the County Courthouse.
Some people called on Amend to run for mayor. Some wanted him to run for governor. Some wanted him to lead an anti-sodomy movement.
“We love you, Dexter,” shouted Jim Mertens.
“This is too much,” said Amend, rocking in his shoes as he took the podium. “It’s just wonderful. I can’t tell you how it thrills my soul.”
Amend, who is a medical doctor, first made his anti-gay comments while discussing the autopsy results of 9-year-old Rachel Carver, killed in June.
The Spokane Human Rights Commission said Amend is engaging in gay bashing and called on him to resign from his $46,883-a-year job.
His critics gathered Thursday night to organize a recall committee against the elected coroner and circulate petitions calling for his ouster. Estimates of the crowd at that rally run between 75 and 150 people.
In a natty bow tie, tan suit and pin-striped shirt, Amend read from a prepared speech Sunday. He said Rachel was psychologically victimized and sodomized for years. Her uncle has been charged in the death.
Amend blended the murder with his belief that sodomy causes AIDS and the corruption of innocent children. He drifted from his text to talk about his dreams and to criticize media reports. His speech meandered and at times was difficult to understand:
“The evidence of long-term sodomy perpetrated on this innocent 9-year-old girl is evidence of rejection by another person of the unknowing girl for the gratification of sexual desires,” Amend said. “The results of the act of sodomy are things I have dealt with as a urologist for 30 years - to try to treat it, cure it or prevent it.”
He said AIDS would not exist if sodomy didn’t exist.
“Semen in the rectum, disregarding the aspects of the human rights of the victim of the sodomic act, causes the viral disease called AIDS,” he said.
Medical experts say the virus that causes AIDS is transmitted through sexual activity, blood transfusions, sharing of intravenous needles, and from mother to fetus inside the womb.
Amend’s speech was punctuated by cheers, amens and more variations on the word sodomy than found in the dictionary.
When he wasn’t speaking, Amend sat next to a woman clenching a sign proclaiming, “Anal intercourse is animalistic.”
After the rally, a receiving line of sorts formed. Everyone wanted to shake Amend’s hand and praise him for voicing his beliefs. One woman gave him a copy of the videotape, “The Gay Agenda.”
Other speakers also took to the podium.
“Liberty means the freedom to do what is morally right, not what is morally wrong,” said the Rev. Casimir Puskorius of Mount St. Michael to loud cheers and applause.
Rally participants said they’ll circulate about 300 petitions supporting Amend.
Michelle Lowell organized the rally because she was angry about last week’s recall rally. “We will take it further if the homosexuals push it further,” Lowell said.
No visible opposition showed up at Sunday’s gathering. Nancy Roxland rode up on her bike. She stood and she listened with her mouth in a tight, thin line. Roxland is gay. She said Amend should be kicked out of office.
“I hate him, and I don’t want to hate him,” said Roxland, who attends church Sundays and Bible class Wednesdays.
“I don’t agree with his views. I’ve had women friends who had AIDS. I had a lover who had AIDS. It’s not fair. We don’t put him in a box. He puts us in a box, like we’re perverts. I’m not a pervert.”
Actually, Amend might not think she is.
He said he doesn’t have a problem with lesbians because they don’t practice sodomy.
“The definition of sodomy is anal sex by a man,” Amend said.
“It can’t be done by a woman. I think it’s clear-cut.”
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo
MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: DEXTER AMEND: IN HIS OWN WORDS This is the prepared text of Spokane County Coroner Dexter Amend’s speech to supporters Sunday:
This time in our society appears to be a period of confusion about what is right and wrong for the best environment for us to live. Freedom and human rights seem to have brought confusion rather than light on the subject of how we should live our lives. I am a spokesman for my beliefs and knowledge as a physician who has done everything within my power to uplift people and not put them down. It is not my nature to disrespect another person, no matter how old they are, or what their sex, color or lifestyle is. My profession is involved with judging such things as diseases and lifestyles, not people. There are many diseases and causes of death. Some are physical, some bacterial and viral, and some psychological. The things related to psychological and thinking can kill in the sense that they can destroy the things and patterns of life that give full meaning to life. A person’s maximal potential is possible in a free nation, if that concept of potential is not destroyed by disrespect and rejection of others. The case and life that brought this whole matter to publication was that of a 9-year-old girl whose psychological life of self-worth had been destroyed by someone committing sodomy on her body. Sodomy by definition is anal sex by a male. The evidence of long-term sodomy perpetrated on this innocent 9-year-old girl is evidence of rejection by another person of the unknowing girl for the gratification of sexual desires. The results of the act of sodomy are things I have dealt with as a urologist for 30 years - to try to treat it, cure it or prevent it. I continue to make judgments daily about the things related to diseases that cause death and as your elected coroner I will continue to do so. Anal intercourse by sodomite men has been a sexual practice dating back into prehistory and it persists to the present time by some in the homosexual community by choice as in the past. Semen in the rectum, disregarding the aspects of the human rights of the victim of the sodomic act, causes the viral disease called AIDS. The retro virus destroys the immune system of the sodomist and eventuates in death by intercurrent infections. There would be no AIDS virus without the practice of sodomy, even though, since its introduction it has spread to others who have contracted the disease and subsequently died. But the overpowering destruction of an innocent child’s psyche through the abnormal practice of sodomy preceded her physical death by a blow on the head. I emphasize that I am not bashing anyone or judging any person, but rather I feel it is my responsibility to judge the things from a professional physician’s point of view and in order to protect society from a disease which causes death both psychologically and physically, I should speak out.
This time in our society appears to be a period of confusion about what is right and wrong for the best environment for us to live. Freedom and human rights seem to have brought confusion rather than light on the subject of how we should live our lives. I am a spokesman for my beliefs and knowledge as a physician who has done everything within my power to uplift people and not put them down. It is not my nature to disrespect another person, no matter how old they are, or what their sex, color or lifestyle is. My profession is involved with judging such things as diseases and lifestyles, not people. There are many diseases and causes of death. Some are physical, some bacterial and viral, and some psychological. The things related to psychological and thinking can kill in the sense that they can destroy the things and patterns of life that give full meaning to life. A person’s maximal potential is possible in a free nation, if that concept of potential is not destroyed by disrespect and rejection of others. The case and life that brought this whole matter to publication was that of a 9-year-old girl whose psychological life of self-worth had been destroyed by someone committing sodomy on her body. Sodomy by definition is anal sex by a male. The evidence of long-term sodomy perpetrated on this innocent 9-year-old girl is evidence of rejection by another person of the unknowing girl for the gratification of sexual desires. The results of the act of sodomy are things I have dealt with as a urologist for 30 years - to try to treat it, cure it or prevent it. I continue to make judgments daily about the things related to diseases that cause death and as your elected coroner I will continue to do so. Anal intercourse by sodomite men has been a sexual practice dating back into prehistory and it persists to the present time by some in the homosexual community by choice as in the past. Semen in the rectum, disregarding the aspects of the human rights of the victim of the sodomic act, causes the viral disease called AIDS. The retro virus destroys the immune system of the sodomist and eventuates in death by intercurrent infections. There would be no AIDS virus without the practice of sodomy, even though, since its introduction it has spread to others who have contracted the disease and subsequently died. But the overpowering destruction of an innocent child’s psyche through the abnormal practice of sodomy preceded her physical death by a blow on the head. I emphasize that I am not bashing anyone or judging any person, but rather I feel it is my responsibility to judge the things from a professional physician’s point of view and in order to protect society from a disease which causes death both psychologically and physically, I should speak out.