It’s difficult not to get the sense, sometimes, when going up against Religious Right activists, that their beef is less with the gay community, but much more about their own personal demons. Such may be the case with Linda Wall, a candidate for the Virginia House of Delegates. If the name “Linda Wall” sounds familiar, it’s because she has shown up in pieces we’ve written in the past on the escaped child kidnapper Lisa Miller, a close friend of Linda’s. While we don’t know whether or not Wall was involved in Miller’s escape — the time she compared herself to Harriet Tubman in her “fight for the children” raised my eyebrows a bit — it’s safe to say that she’s extremely anti-gay and has little understanding of or respect for the law. So of course, we are not surprised to find out that back in the 1970′s, when she was a physical education teacher, she carried on a relationship with one of her junior high students:
A conservative independent seeking a House of Delegates seat from Appomattox says when she was a junior high teacher 40 years ago she had an affair with a female student but that she was a “different person” back then.
In an Associated Press interview on Wednesday, Linda Wall confirmed her sworn 2006 testimony in a lawsuit in which she admitted to “sexual relations with a minor” in the early 1970s when she taught physical education in Prince George County. The 61-year-old Wall said the affair was a long-ago, youthful mistake, not who she is now.
“I’ve never tried to hide that I was in homosexuality. If anybody Googles me, they would find that out there,” Wall said.
OH, Linda, back the hell up. This has nothing to do with you being “in homosexuality,” as it is a known fact that gays are no more likely to molest children than straight people are. So please do not think readers are so ignorant as to let you say, “oh well, I was gay then, but now I’m redeemed!”
The woman admits that she molested a female junior high student. At some point on her alleged path to healing and redemption, she was fed and adopted wholeheartedly the lie that her lesbianism was to blame for her molesting a female junior high student. I am quite sorry, but in the real world, that is not the excuse. Neither is this:
“Forty years ago I was a different person. I was a heavy pot smoker with … impaired judgment and made some bad choices,” she said. “You do that out of college sometimes. Some people do, some people don’t.”
“Oh, I was a stoner back then! Sometimes people get out of college and diddle little girls. Some people do, some people don’t.”
No.
Far from seeking elected office, Linda Wall needs to be seeking professional help, from REAL professionals, rather than the fundamentalist charlatan types who have convinced her that lesbianism and the demon weed are to blame for her molestation of a junior high student.
The politician who released the deposition where Linda admitted all of this, Paul Jost, had this to say:
“I did it because it shows Linda Wall is not fit to hold public office,” said Jost, who moved to Florida several years ago but retains business interests in Hampton Roads.
“To me, this isn’t about her sexuality. People have different feelings about that. To me, this is about a criminal act and that’s why I felt that it needed to be disclosed,” he said, denying that he acted to settle an old score.
Indeed. And I will say again what I said above, a little more strongly: it seems that, when dealing with staunchly anti-gay activists, it might be wise to assume from the outset that their public bigotry is somehow related to battles with their own private demons.
A federal grand jury in Vermont has indicted Timothy Miller, a Mennonite missionary who is accused of aiding Lisa Miller (no relation) in abducting 9-year-old Isabella Miller-Jenkins and taking her to Nicaragua.
According to the Associated Press, the indictment was dated May 12. According to an AP update, Timothy Miller remains free on bond.
Lisa Miller entered a Vermont civil union in 2000 with her then-partner, Janet Jenkins. After conceiving Isabella, Miller declared herself to be an “ex-lesbian” evangelical Christian and absconded to Virginia with Isabella in violation of family-court rulings granting visitation rights to Jenkins. In an interview with Christian media, Miller acknowledged a past of emotional instability and abuse, and indicated that she had not been sexually attracted to Jenkins despite her claim to be ex-lesbian. In late 2009, after years of adverse court rulings, Miller fled the country with Isabella, and full legal custody of Isabella was granted to Jenkins in Miller’s absence.
CBN News says Timothy Miller could face up to three years in prison and a $250,000 fine if convicted.
Lisa Miller and Janet Jenkins were united in a Vermont civil union in 2000. But in subsequent interviews, it became apparent that Miller was not sexually attracted to Jenkins; she may have entered the relationship as a coping mechanism in her struggle with childhood abuse and codependency.
In 2003, Miller became an “ex-gay” activist and absconded to Virginia with Isabella, the couple’s daughter. Utilizing support from Christian Right groups, Miller launched a seven-year campaign in which she violated a series of family-court rulings and appellate decisions in favor of Jenkins’ visitation rights. Due to the repeat violations and failures to appear in court, Miller’s custody rights were revoked in late 2009. At that time, Lisa allegedly abducted Isabella and became a fugitive.
As just reported in the Rutland Herald (pay site), there has been an arrest in the custody case involving former civil-union partners Janet Jenkins and Lisa Miller, and their daughter, Isabella Miller-Jenkins. Lisa did not comply with a court order to transfer custody of Isabella to Janet on January 1, 2010.
The person arrested is one Timothy David Miller (link to criminal complaint). Little more is known at this point.
Janet Jenkins issued the following statement from her home in Vermont:
“I’m grateful to everyone in law enforcement for working so hard on finding my daughter, as well as to my attorney, Sarah Star. I know very little at this point, but I really hope that this means that Isabella is safe and well. I am looking forward to having my daughter home safe with me very soon.”
Attorney Sarah Star of Middlebury, who has been representing Janet, said, “It is clear that the government has been working hard on this. Janet is very pleased and we are both hopeful that this will be a step in the right direction of bringing Isabella home. At this point we need to let law enforcement do their work, and recognize that there are still steps to go.”
Mr. Miller will make an initial appearance in U.S. District Court for the District of Vermont in Burlington on Monday, April 25, at 9 a.m.
Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders has represented Janet at the appellate level in Vermont; Lambda Legal has represented Janet at the appellate level in Virginia.
The Rutland Herald identifies Timothy as “a Tennessee man and Central American missionary” who arranged passage to Nicaragua for Lisa Miller and her non-custodial daughter. Prosecutors say Timothy, who is not related to Lisa, is one of several individuals who aided Lisa as a fugitive from justice. Timothy was arrested in Virginia.
According to the Herald:
In emails and social media messages obtained through federal search warrants, investigators say they tracked Miller’s departure from the U.S. through a border crossing near Buffalo, N.Y., on Sept. 22, 2009.
On that same day, Miller reportedly boarded a plane in Ontario that took her and her daughter to Mexico City. From there, the pair passed through El Salvador before arriving in Nicaragua where investigators say Miller is associated with the Christian Aid Ministries organization in Managua, Nicaragua.
The Herald adds that the Christian Right’s Liberty Counsel — which has filed frivolous lawsuits on behalf of Exodus International and other antigay groups against watchdogs and tolerant school districts — may have aided the abduction.
Investigators say they found an email conversation between Tim Miller and Philip Zodhiates, who Kaegel described as a “leader” within Liberty Counsel — the Virginia-based group whose lawyers defended Miller.
The email messages, sent in November, 2009, are referenced under the subject lines as “bag for Nicaragua” and discuss the sending of packages from Virginia to Nicaragua.
“They are just personal belongings of someone who recently moved to Managua doing missions work and a few things they can’t buy there readily like peanut butter. So it is nothing you need to declare on the customs form,” Zodhiates wrote in an email to a man in Virginia.
Lisa Miller’s lawyers said in court at the beginning of 2010 that they did not know the whereabouts of their client.
As Truth Wins Out has previously observed, Liberty Counsel attorney Rena Lindevaldsen affirmed the abduction of Isabella and covered for Lisa during missed court appearances around the time of the abduction. Other watchdog groups such as People for the American Way have noted the extremes to which Liberty Counsel has gone, to place Isabella in the hands of an apparently unfit “ex-gay” parent.
Every judge in the land is activist, you see, what with the way they read the law and stuff:
WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court has declined to step into a lesbian custody dispute between a woman who has renounced her homosexuality and her onetime partner.
The justices on Monday turned down an appeal from Lisa Miller, the biological mother of an 8-year-old girl. Miller wanted the court to undo a Virginia court decision allowing Janet Jenkins visitation rights with the girl.
Lisa Miller is still on the lam, of course.
This comes on the heels of the Vermont Supreme Court granting full custody of the kidnapping victim, Isabella, to her mother Janet Jenkins.
It’s too bad Isabella Miller-Jenkins’ other mother, Lisa Miller, is apparently a kidnapper. The Vermont Supreme Court has weighed in on the court order which gave Janet Jenkins sole custody of her daughter:
The Vermont supreme court has unanimously granted custody to a lesbian who has been battling to become the guardian of the young girl she and her former partner raised together.
The ruling is in favor of Vermont resident Janet Jenkins, affirming a 2009 court order giving her sole physical and legal custody of Isabella Miller-Jenkins. Lisa Miller, Jenkins’ former partner, is still missing with their 8-year-old daughter, according to Gay and Lesbian Advocates & Defenders, which argued on Jenkins’ behalf before the supreme court.
This story is just so sad, and shows the childish lengths fundamentalist Christians will go to to defend their fantasy-based worldview.
Also, Truth Wins Out sadly said goodbye to actor and board member Glenn Shadix, who passed away this week.
As for music this week, I think it was about two weekends ago when I literally, out of nowhere, listened to Nina Simone, and nothing but Nina Simone, for about forty-eight hours. I needed it. I still remember being a freshman in high school, when a friend handed me a Nina Simone CD, the debut from Portishead, and Fugees’ The Score, and simply said, “these are things you need in your life.” She was correct. The first song I ever heard was “I Want A Little Sugar In My Bowl,” which remains one of my very favorites. A close second is “Love Me Or Leave Me.” So we’ll listen to those, then hit shuffle on the iTunes machine, and see where we end up.
1. Tori Amos – “Beauty Queen/Horses”
2. Prana – “The Dream”
3. Phoebe Killdeer & The Short Straws – “Let Me”
4. jj – “My Love”
5. Das Racist – “One Dollar Can” [this is actually an ode to Arizona Iced Tea, no lie]
6. Toad the Wet Sprocket – “All I Want”
7. Primary 1 – “Clicks Like That”
8. Tricky – “My Evil Is Strong”
9. Beck – “Readymade”
10. Xiu Xiu – “Dear God, I Hate Myself”
You can, by the way, download the Das Racist mixtape completely legally and for free here, and let me assure you that if you like really freaking smart Hip-Hop type things, you will enjoy.
Lisa Miller is the one-half of a Vermont lesbian couple that conceived daughter Isabella with partner Janet Jenkins — and then abducted Isabella and took her to Virginia. There, prejudiced state courts violated Vermont’s family-law jurisdiction over the family and allowed Miller to violate Jenkins’ visitation rights until the court rulings were overturned by Virginia’s Supreme Court in 2007.
Since then, Miller lived more-or-less openly as a fugitive — violating Jenkins’ visitation rights, showcasing her daughter as a Christian Right political trophy, and sharing her story of troubled celibacy and sexual confusion (which she described as an ex-lesbian fundamentalist freedom) to Christian Right media. Then, late last year, because Miller had violated Jenkins’ visitation rights since 2004, a Vermont judge issued a final ruling granting sole custody of Isabella to Jenkins.
By the time of that ruling, however, it appears that Miller had already absconded with Isabella again. Miller abandoned her Virginia home and left her lawyers at the fundamentalist Liberty Counsel supposedly unaware of her wishes and whereabouts, even as they continued to represent Miller in court.
LezGetReal now believes that Miller is hiding as a “missionary” in Quito, Ecuador, using a church group affiliated with HCJB Global as shelter for the abduction.
We hope that U.S. and Ecuadorian authorities urgently investigate.
The Lisa Miller/Janet Jenkins saga continues, as the case was argued before the Vermont Supreme Court, with Lisa Miller and Isabella, of course, still likely out of the country:
(Dillon) This is the second time that the Supreme Court has heard arguments in a bitter child custody battle between two women who were former partners.
But the case took a new turn in January, when Lisa Miller – who now lives in Virginia – failed to appear to hand over the child in a court-ordered custody swap.
Miller’s lawyer is Rena Lindevaldsen. She says she hasn’t heard from her client in months and doesn’t know where she is. And she told the state Supreme Court that a Vermont trial judge was wrong to award custody to Miller’s former partner. (Lindevaldsen) You’re switching from the first time anywhere in this nation from a fit biological parent that individual’s child and switching to somebody who has been declared to be a parent who is not that child’s biological or adoptive parent.
(Dillon) But associate Justice John Dooley challenged the lawyer on a number of points. First, Dooley asked: what about men whose children were conceived through reproductive technologies.” (Dooley) “So I take it your position would be the same to a father, to a husband, for whose spouse was impregnated by artificial insemination – he could not ask for custody in a proceeding if they went through a divorce? Is that right?”
(Lindevaldsen) “Unless of course he adopted the child in the meantime.”
(Dillon) But Dooley said because the couple had been joined in a Vermont civil union the child did not have to be adopted in order for Jenkins to be considered a legal parent.
Then Chief Justice Paul Reiber weighed in. Reiber brought up the issue of Lisa Miller’s contempt of court citations. The Virginia woman faces arrest because she defied a court order and disappeared with the child. (Reiber) “You said a few moments ago that your client, your referred to her as a “fit parent.” Hasn’t she had seven or eight contempt orders issued against her?”
That’s the trouble with anti-gay fundamentalists trying to be heard in courts of law. Since everything they believe is preposterous nonsense, it doesn’t tend to go well for them.
An 8-year-old girl at the heart of a long-running child custody fight between former lesbian partners may have fled to Central America with her birth mother, a lawyer for one of the women said.
The girl, Isabella Miller-Jenkins, and her birth mother, Lisa Miller, failed to appear for a court-ordered custody swap in January and are believed to have flown to El Salvador last September, said attorney Sarah Star, who represents ex-partner Janet Jenkins.
Star said a Virginia police officer told her that Miller and the girl flew to El Salvador’s capital, San Salvador, from Juarez, Mexico, which is across the Rio Grande from El Paso, Texas.
“This is obviously horrifying,” Star said Thursday. “Isabella’s not in school. She’s most likely in a country that is not as developed as the U.S., and (Jenkins is) worried about her. She’s worried she’s not in a safe environment. As far as we know, Lisa Miller doesn’t even speak Spanish.”
In case you’re new, you’ll remember that Isabella Miller-Jenkins is the daughter of Lisa Miller and Janet Jenkins, who decided to bring her into the world when they were a couple. They later were joined in a civil union, until Lisa Miller suddenly went off the deep end, converted to fundamentalist Christianity, and decided that, because of her newfound homophobia, therefore the law did not apply to her. Because of her violation of numerous court orders for visitation, Lisa Miller was to hand custody of Isabella over to Janet Jenkins in January of this year.
Lisa and Isabella have now been missing for six months.
It was January 1 when Linda Wall said she knew for sure her friend Miller and her seven-year-old daughter Isabella had gone into hiding.
“Unbeknowing [sic] to any of us… she was doing something behind the scene,” Wall said.
(…)
“I am supposed to be the number one suspect because I was so involved in this and I don’t know where she is,” Wall said.
(…)
The last time Wall says she had contact with Miller was in late September. Up to that point, she believes Miller was working behind the scenes on her escape. It’ a decision they support.
“I do support what she’s done,” Wall said. “When the law is wrong, what’s a person to do?”
Likening the situation to the underground railroad during slavery, “Was it Harriet Tubman who risked her life for the underground railroad for the black community? Maybe I am committed to this for the children I might be that one voice.”
Linda, I’m “unbeknowing” whether you’re ignorant of history or getting caught up in lies, but I should point out that the comparisons to Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad run the risk of being revelatory, since Harriet Tubman decidedly did know where the Underground Railroad was, since she personally helped a number of slaves escape. What other historical figures do you identify with, Linda? Miep Gies, perhaps?
All of these comparisons are silly, obviously, because all Lisa Miller is doing is trying to “protect” her child from her other loving mother, Janet Jenkins, who has a legal and moral right to be in Isabella’s life.
The fact that Wall’s and Miller’s interpretations of reality are straight out of a C.S. Lewis fever dream should have no bearing on what they’re allowed to do in actual reality.
It’s difficult not to get the sense, sometimes, when going up against Religious Right activists, that their beef is less with the gay community, but much more about their own personal demons. Such may be the case with Linda Wall, a candidate for the Virginia House of Delegates. If the name “Linda Wall” sounds familiar, it’s because she has shown up in pieces we’ve written in the past on the escaped child kidnapper Lisa Miller, a close friend of Linda’s. While we don’t know whether or not Wall was involved in Miller’s escape — the time she compared herself to Harriet Tubman in her “fight for the children” raised my eyebrows a bit — it’s safe to say that she’s extremely anti-gay and has little understanding of or respect for the law. So of course, we are not surprised to find out that back in the 1970′s, when she was a physical education teacher, she carried on a relationship with one of her junior high students:
Since then, Miller lived more-or-less openly as a fugitive — violating Jenkins’ visitation rights, showcasing her daughter as a Christian Right political trophy, and sharing her story of troubled celibacy and sexual confusion (which she described as an ex-lesbian fundamentalist freedom) to Christian Right media. Then, late last year, because Miller had violated Jenkins’ visitation rights since 2004, a Vermont judge issued a final ruling granting sole custody of Isabella to Jenkins.
