November 14 1994

ARTICLE TOOLS

Find similar articles E-mail this page

* The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights has placed sexual abstinence posters on New York, Washington, D.C., and Boston transit systems to counter condom ads sponsored by AIDS awareness groups. League operations director C. Joseph Doyle says Boston-subway condom ads emphasize "inconsistency, irresponsibility, and hypocrisy" of public schools preaching against smoking and drinking, yet responding to the AIDS crisis by distributing condoms. "Tax funds subsidizing such behavior is morally objectionable."

* Jim Bakker, released from prison in July after serving four-and-a-half years for mail and wire fraud, now faces a civil suit reinstated by a three-judge federal panel in Charlotte, North Carolina. The securities fraud suit was filed against the former Praise the Lord televangelist by six of the 150,000 people who bought $1,000 "lifetime partnerships" at the 2,300-acre Heritage USA resort that went bankrupt.

* A seven-year free-speech legal battle at Lindbergh (Wash.) High School is over, as U.S. District Court Judge Walter McGovern ordered the Renton school district to pay students $400,000 to cover their attorney fees. McGovern upheld a unanimous March 1993 federal appeals court decision, which said students must be allowed to hold Bible study and prayer in an empty classroom before school under the 1984 Equal Access Act.

* Lee College in Cleveland, Tennessee, dedicated Atkins-Ellis Hall September 23 to replace a dormitory destroyed by arson a year ago (CT, Dec. 13, 1993, p. 65). The 18 students hurt in the blaze have recovered, and four persons have been sentenced to prison in connection with the fire; the one convicted of lighting the match received a 19-year sentence. An insurance settlement covered about half ...