WEST PALM BEACH, FLORIDA – A woman claims her boss made a habit of exposing himself and twisting his scrotum into animal shapes, including “the goat” and a flying bat. She says that after she complained, Thadeus Pryor fired her on a pretext.
Lia Vanella sued Thadeus Pryor, World Wide Child Care, and Children of America Inc. in Palm Beach County Court.
Vanella, a former account manager for Children of America, lists 103 examples of Pryor’s alleged harassment. Among other things, she says he called her a “pig whore,” mooned his employees at company outings, told her “you turn me on. … look at my dick,” and made other vile comments.
Vanella claims Pryor liked to play a vulgar game popularized by the movie “Waiting,” in which men unexpectedly reveal their genitalia to co-workers.
She says the obscene shenanigans were commonplace at her office. She claims Pryor often flashed her and manipulated his testicles to give the appearance of “the bat, brain, and goat.”
Vanella says she was fired on accusations of stealing a computer, but the real reason was that she rebuffed Pryor’s sexual advances.
Pryor’s attorney, Steven Siegel, said Vanella’s claims are outlandish. Siegel said his client denies the allegations, but declined to comment further on the case.
Vanella’s suit is the only sexual harassment claim filed against Pryor in Palm Beach County, where Children of America’s headquarters is based.
Pryor, a former kickboxing champion turned entrepreneur, is president and CEO of Children of America, a child-care chain with 23 centers across the Northeast, according to its Web site.
From 1982 to 1987, Pryor won a series of World Karate and Kick-Boxing Association super-middleweight titles, according to his Web site.
He recently moved into low-budget action movie production through his company World Films, his Web site states. His critically bashed thriller, “The Last Sentinel,” was picked up by the Sci-Fi Channel in 2007.
Vanella seeks damages for emotional distress, civil assault, negligence and defamation. She is represented by William Julien of Boca Raton.
from Courthouse News Service
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The Flying Bat

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ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA – A St. Paul man who pleaded guilty to having sex with a 13-year-old boy he’d met on the Internet — until the boy’s adult sister walked in on them — was sentenced Monday to 90 days in the Ramsey County Workhouse.
Yury Tarshis, 27, has a three-year sentence hanging over his head if he violates probation.
Asked if he had anything to say at the Ramsey County sentencing hearing, Tarshis said he did make “a big mistake.” He added that the experience had been hard on him.
District Judge Michael DeCourcy snapped back, “Hard on you? Imagine how hard it is on the victim.”
DeCourcy sentenced Tarshis based on the state sentencing guidelines for third-degree criminal sexual conduct when the defendant has no prior criminal record.
He also directed Tarshis to be on probation for 15 years, to abstain from all drugs and alcohol and to have no contact with the victim in the case or with any minor children unless approved by probation. He will be required to register as a predator offender for the next 10 years.
Tarshis began serving his sentence immediately, although he asked to spend the holidays at home.
He was charged with the crime after he contacted the boy via an Internet chat room. They arranged for Tarshis to come to the boy’s house on Watson Street in St. Paul on Aug. 15.
An adult sister of the boy told police she came home to find the two in the boy’s bed. The defendant hid in a closet. She held him at the home until police arrived.
The boy reported that Tarshis had initiated sexual contact and he didn’t know what to do, so he went along with it. He said he did not know that Tarshis was as old as he was until he came to the house.
Tarshis admitted he engaged in oral and anal sex with the boy.
from The Pioneer Press

MEXICO CITY, MEXICO – Mexico City lawmakers on Monday made the city the first in Latin America to legalize same-sex marriage, a change that will give homosexual couples more rights, including allowing them to adopt children.
The bill passed the capital’s local assembly 39-20 to the cheers of supporters who yelled: “Yes, we could! Yes, we could!”
Leftist Mayor Marcelo Ebrard of the Democratic Revolution Party was widely expected to sign the measure into law.
Mexico City’s left-led assembly has made several decisions unpopular elsewhere in this deeply Roman Catholic country, including legalizing abortion in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. That decision sparked a backlash, with the majority of Mexico’s other 32 states enacting legislation declaring life begins at conception.
The conservative Nation Action Party of President Felipe Calderon has vowed to challenge the gay marriage law in the courts. However, homosexuality is increasingly accepted in Mexico, with gay couples openly holding hands in parts of the capital and the annual gay pride parade drawing tens of thousands.
The bill calls for changing the definition of marriage in the city’s civil code. Marriage is currently defined as the union of a man and a woman. The new definition will be “the free uniting of two people.”
The change would allow same-sex couples to adopt children, apply for bank loans together, inherit wealth and be included in the insurance policies of their spouse, rights they were denied under civil unions allowed in the city.
“We are so happy,” said Temistocles Villanueva, a 23-year-old film student who celebrated by passionately kissing his boyfriend outside the city’s assembly.
Only seven countries allow gay marriages: Canada, Spain, South Africa, Sweden, Norway, the Netherlands and Belgium. U.S. states that permit same-sex marriage are Iowa, Massachusetts, Vermont, Connecticut and New Hampshire.
Argentina’s capital became the first Latin American city to legalize same-sex civil unions in 2002 for gay and lesbian couples. Four other Argentine cities later did the same, and as did Mexico City in 2007 and some Mexican and Brazilian states. Uruguay alone has legalized civil unions nationwide.
Buenos Aires lawmakers introduced a bill for legalizing gay marriage in the national Congress in October but it has stalled without a vote, and officials in the South American city have blocked same-sex wedding because of conflicting judicial rulings.
Many people in Mexico and elsewhere in Latin America remain opposed to gay marriage, and the dominant Roman Catholic Church has announced its opposition.
“They have given Mexicans the most bitter Christmas,” said Armando Martinez, the president of the College of Catholic Attorneys. “They are permitting adoption (by gay couples) and in one stroke of the pen have erased the term ‘mother’ and ‘father.’”
City lawmaker Victor Romo, a member of the mayor’s leftist party, called it a historic day.
“For centuries unjust laws banned marriage between blacks and whites or Indians and Europeans,” he said. “Today all barriers have disappeared.”
from The Associated Press

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MILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN – Without discussion, the Milwaukee School Board voted 7-0 Thursday night to make condoms available at many of the city’s high schools, paving the way to make Milwaukee Public Schools one of the relatively few districts in the nation to provide contraception to students.
The communicable disease prevention program, as the district calls it, could be in place as soon as the 2010-’11 school year.
The proposal sparked some opposition after being made public Dec. 2, but the board approved the condom distribution without much dissent. Comments from the public are not allowed at board meetings and a board committee had voted 5-0 on Dec. 9 to recommend adopting the program.
The condoms will be available free of charge, but only to students in high schools that have school nurses and only after students request them at the nurse’s office, according to a fact sheet circulated by the school district. Up to two condoms will be distributed at a time.
Thursday’s vote does not authorize funding for the program, but the district has said it will not use taxpayer money to buy condoms and instead will seek other sources of funding.
In proposing the program, the school district said a 2009 study found that nearly 63% of MPS high school students were sexually active, and that nearly one-third of those students had not used a condom the last time they had sexual intercourse.
Also cited were figures that rate Milwaukee high among U.S. cities in births to teen mothers and “particularly high” in the incidence of certain sexually transmitted diseases.
The district noted that its sex education policy takes an abstinence-based approach to reducing the risk of communicable diseases. And it says research shows that students are more likely to use condoms if they are available in schools but no more likely to be sexually active.
When the proposal was first publicized, Sally Ladky, executive director of the Milwaukee-based Wisconsin Abstinence Coalition, said that a comprehensive medical exam, testing for sexually transmitted diseases, and a full report of a student’s medical and family history should be required before any school offered a student contraception.
Citing the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the school district said 4.5% of high schools in the country make condoms available to students.
Last month, Democrats in the state Legislature tried to pass a bill that would require schools that teach sex education to instruct students about birth control, but Republicans blocked final passage of the measure.
Republicans offered amendments – rejected by Democrats – that would have required schools to teach students about fetal development and the potential for criminal charges against underage students for having sex.
from The Journal Sentinel