Gay stalkers arrested after they push too far at the daily newspaper
By Peter Cassels

Two gay men long known for their controversial, disruptive and outrageous AIDS activism are in the San Francisco County Jail in lieu of posting half a million dollars bail each following their arrests Nov. 28 on charges of stalking and making terrorist threats against city health officials and staff members of the city's largest daily newspaper.

David Pasquarelli, a member of ACT UP/San Francisco, a group that contends that the HIV virus does not cause AIDS, and Michael Petrelis, another longtime activist, are being held on multiple felony charges punishable by sentences of as long as three years in prison. The men were arrested as they left a hearing in San Francisco Superior Court on civil harassment suits brought by two officials of the city health department and five San Francisco Chronicle reporters and editors, all allegedly the targets of threatening telephone calls.

On Nov. 30, a judge refused to reduce the $500,000 bail for each of the accused. A preliminary hearing on the charges will be held Dec. 13.

According to the Chronicle's lawyers, Pasquarelli and Petrelis made threatening phone calls after the newspaper published articles in October about the rise of unsafe sex practices among gay men in San Francisco and an increase in syphilis among gay and bisexual men. The newspaper also accuses Petrelis of making a bomb threat that caused evacuation of its offices Nov. 11. Joining in the civil suit were Dr. Jeffrey Klausner, the city health department's director of sexually transmitted disease prevention and control services, and Michael Shriver, Mayor Willie Brown's AIDS adviser, who reported receiving similar calls.

Pasquarelli and Petrelis had attended the hearing on temporary restraining orders resulting from the suits just before their arrests. Activists and Pasquarelli's attorney call the arrests on criminal charges an overreaction.

Fred Gardner, spokesperson for San Francisco District Attorney Terence Hallinan, would not comment to Bay Windows on the case, saying, ``Ordinarily, the district attorney saves public comments for court." However, Reginald Smith, Hallinan's law office manager, told the Chronicle Nov. 28: ``Stalking is a crime of mental terrorism. The defendants have been on a campaign of terror against these victims, who fear for their safety and for their families' safety."
``It's unfortunate that the city had to pursue such serious charges, but they had clearly had crossed the line from activism to criminal behavior, so we are hopeful that this will result in a change in their behavior and continued safety of the victims, including myself and my family, such that we are able to do our jobs to improve the health of all San Franciscans, including gay men," Klausner said in a Nov. 30 interview. The health official reported that Petrelis made threatening, obscene and hostile phone calls to him, members of his family and their nanny. Klausner also charged that Petrelis sent similar messages in faxes to him. ``He also called on others to [attack] the health department with slanderous advertisements, libelous claims, and posters in the community depicting me as a Nazi," Klausner said. He also accused both men of waging ``a media campaign of terror trying to destabilize the public health response to HIV and STDs in San Francisco."

In a Dec. 3 interview, Mark Vermeulen, Pasquarelli's attorney, contended the district attorney's office overreacted, that the matter should have remained in civil court, and that his client and Petrelis had complied with the temporary restraining orders protecting the Chronicle staff, which were extended to Dec. 20 at the Nov. 28 civil hearing. Similar orders were issued to protect the two health officials. ``The purpose of the hearing was to address the temporary restraining order. [Both men] showed up for the hearingÖ and they agreed to keep the temporary retraining orders in place and to continue to comply with them."

Vermeulen added that he was disappointed in and surprised by the arrests on criminal charges because he had been promised on the evening of Nov. 27 by a district attorney's office supervisor that there were no warrants out for their arrests. ``We had agreed to make the clients available for voluntary surrender, [the district attorney's] standard operating procedure, if a warrant was to be issued."

Contending that the case should have remained a civil matter, Pasquarelli's attorney maintained that ``at the very worst, it is misdemeanor conduct and, quite frankly, what it is is activism. Some may term it as outrageous activism and some might term it outside the envelope. These guys are not unaccustomed to controversy."

Vermeulen also stated that the men might have been arrested because of the political clout of the health officials and the Chronicle, which he characterized as ``the most powerful newspaper in San Francisco." He added that the arrests might be attributed to the San Francisco Police Department's investigating officer ``misinterpreting" what Chronicle reporters said, particularly about the bomb threat. Vermeulen said his understanding was that Petrelis ``categorically denied" the threat. A phone call Bay Windows placed to Stewart Blumstein, Petrelis's attorney, was not returned.

Observers say widespread coverage of allegedly rising syphilis rates among San Francisco gay men and an article by Andrew Webb in the November issue of Washington Monthly may have prompted Pasquarelli and Petrelis to take the alleged actions that sparked the civil suit and their arrests.

The magazine article reported that Klausner ``has suggested a number of measures, some coercive, which he thinks would slow the increase of new HIV infections among gay men. Among them: closing sex clubs and adult bookstores; enforcing no-sex ordinances in bars and clubs; enforcing no-drug policies in bars and clubs; and Internet-based outreach and education, particularly in chat rooms where many gay men meet new sexual partners."

Webb's article continued: ``Putting aside political realities when brainstorming on this subject, Klausner also raised the possibility of quarantining those who cannot control their infectivity--e.g., those barebackers who've infected 20 different people and still refuse to use condoms."

In his interview with Bay Windows, Klausner denied that he ever called for such measures: ``I've never advocated shutting down any chat room or venue or any place of business. That's counterproductive. The quarantining statement also is false and not true. There is no consideration or discussion of any potential policy that would result in restrictions of people's civil liberties, any isolation, or any quarantine."

Quarantine charges refuted

Webb seemed to substantiate Klausner's denials. According to the Nov. 29 issue of San Francisco Frontiers, a gay newsmagazine, Webb sent an unsolicited e-mail to San Francisco Health Director Dr. Mitchell Katz stating that he, not Klausner, raised the possibility of quarantine and explicitly supported Klausner's claim that the activists took his statements out of context in a way that misrepresents the actual exchange that Webb reported.

The Washington Monthly article, along with what Petrelis has termed inflated statistics on increased STD rates among gay men, apparently caused him to widely disseminate an e-mail message Bay Windows obtained in which he urged a ``call to action."
``If you have followed my alarming e-mails recently about the war being waged on fags in Frisco by AIDS, Inc., CDC, SF DPH AIDS Office, SF DPH STD unit, etc. This one revolting fag will not take it anymore without a fight," the message stated.

A `revolting fag'

``Please call these public officials and tell them, `I am a revolting fag from Frisco fed up with CDC and AIDS Inc. warfare targeting gay men," the message continued. ``All public health officials must condemn SF DPH STD chief Dr. Josef Mengele KKKlausner and his call for quarantining gay men with HIV. In fucking fag Frisco! No more shit heaped on this revolting fag by the CDC with taxpayer dollars! I will demand Congress CUT, CUT, CUT the CDC's HIV prevention budget to the bone." The message contained the home phone numbers of CDC officials and New York Times staff members.

Petrelis also contacted Bay Windows reporter Beth Berlo after she wrote a story on rising STD rates in San Francisco for the Oct. 18 issue. In an AOL Instant Message to Berlo, Petrelis wrote, ``Klausner's a Nazi and you kiss his ass." Berlo reported that Petrelis also sent her harassing e-mail and phoned a member of her family to get her home phone number. ``When he finally reached my number, he left a long rambling message on voicemail warning me I'd be hearing from him again," she said.

In a Dec. 3 interview, Wayne Turner of ACT UP/DC in Washington, a longtime friend of Petrelis, called the criminal charges ``absolutely outrageous."
``Michael has been a huge thorn in the side of the AIDS establishment and city officials in San Francisco," Turner observed. ``I see this as an egregious prosecution. Terence Hallinan links us to all the hysteria around terrorism. There are certainly federal and state proposals for quarantining." Of allegations that Petrelis made a bomb threat, the D.C. activist remarked, ``[He] is way too smart to call in any kind of bomb threats, so I don't give any credence to that."

Turner reported that he first met Petrelis in 1991 when he traveled to New Hampshire to organize an AIDS march to coincide with the 1992 presidential primary. He listed that among the many contributions Petrelis has made to the gay and HIV/AIDS communities over the years.

``Out of that march we formed the ACT UP Presidential Project," Turner recalled. ``It generated this wonderful grassroots movement of activists all over the country to demand that AIDS be addressed. [Then presidential candidate Bill] Clinton made promises to make AIDS a top priority."

Targeting Clinton

Turner added that Petrelis also advocated for repeal of the Arkansas sodomy law, adopted when Clinton was attorney general. ``That struck us as quite curious," Turner said. ``Clinton was campaigning around the country saying how pro-gay he was." Petrelis also fought ``almost single-handedly," Turner added, for the Navy to prosecute the murderers of gay sailor Alan Schindler.

Turner said Petrelis is not alone in challenging the validity of the San Francisco Health Department's STD statistics: ``His question was, `How many tests did you perform?' If you perform 1,000 tests one year and 10,000 tests another year, of course you will get an increase. We still don't know how many tests they did. Asking those types of questions is not undermining the government. It is demanding accountability from the government."

Paul Varnell, whose column appears in Bay Windows and other newspapers, has been writing about gay and HIV news and issues for more than a decade. He pointed out in an interview that Petrelis may misunderstand the role of the news media: ``Much of the press in the U.S. tends to take what government authorities say very seriously. We trust government a great deal. Michael seems to want the news media to be far more skeptical and do their own investigative reporting about things the CDC and health departments were doing. What one might have urged Michael and his colleagues to do is develop their own facts, get their own data lined up, present it to news media and say, `This is why we believe the health department is wrong.' The media will take that kind of thing seriously. Controversy is news. But we're not really, except for the rare reporter, in a position to do a thorough investigation of what the government says. That is a sad truth."

Turner said the news media should not be above criticism: ``As I recall in the early days of ACT UP, the New York group put `The New York Times is out of order' stickers on [its vending] boxes. So going after the press when you think the reporting isn't equitable is also a tried and true activist tactic. My late partner Steve always said, `Never get into fights with people who buy ink by the barrel and paper by the ton.' I don't necessarily agree with it, but it is certainly a longtime activist tool."

Peter Cassels is the Associate Editor at Bay Windows. His e-mail address is pcassels@baywindows.com

 

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