MIDDLETOWN, Conn. (AP) – A Superior Court jury has rejected harassment claims filed by a prison guard who claims she was targeted for discrimination because she is a lesbian.

The jury of two women and four men deliberated for a little more than two hours before reaching its verdict.

Bonnie L. Duart, 39, of Norwich, had claimed State Department of Correction officials discriminated against Duart and retaliated against her after she filed a complaint with the state Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities.

Duart has been with the prison system since 1988 and now is a correction officer at the Bergin Correctional Institution at Storrs.

According to her lawsuit, her problems began in October 1999 when she was working at a prison in Uncasville.

At that time, the lawsuit claims, Capt. Duane Kelley told her she was wearing her hair outside her collar against regulations and reported to Warden Gurukaur Khalsa that Duart was the girlfriend of another female employee.

From that point on, Duart’s lawsuit said, Khalsa and Kelley made false and exaggerated allegations against her, and harassed her about her hairstyle.

The lawsuit claims that after Durat filed a discrimination complaint in 2000 against the correction department with the state Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities, the harassment got worse.

Correction officials denied Duart was harassed or discriminated against, or had been the subject of retaliation.

HONOLULU, Hawaii (AP) – The United States’ largest association of psychologists is backing same-sex marriage.

The American Psychological Association’s Council of Representatives made its support official on the first day of the group’s annual convention in Waikiki, Hawaii. The council also expressed opposition to discrimination against lesbian and gay parents.

It also found same-sex and heterosexual couples remarkably similar, and parenting effectiveness and children’s psychological well being unrelated to parental sexual orientation.

The positions, drawn up by the APA Working Group on Same-Sex Families and Relationships, are meant to guide psychologists in the public debate over civil marriage for same-sex couples.

“In the context of the huge social and political debate that is currently going on, APA and psychologists had to grapple with the issue of what psychology believes is in the public interest in this controversy,” said Armand R. Cerbone, a Chicago psychologist who chaired the working group.

The seven-member working group based its recommendations on research into same-sex relationships and families.

The Washington-base APA has more than 150,000 members, including researchers, educators, clinicians, consultants and students.

HONOR, Mich. (AP) – Organizers of an annual gay and lesbian bicycle tour say someone set a fire and left hate messages at the group’s northern Michigan campsite.

The attack was discovered about 12:30 a.m. July 25 at the campsite used by Friends North, members say.

A fire destroyed a plastic portable toilet stall, and campers formed a bucket brigade to douse it. Afterward, campers found handwritten, anti-gay messages littering the site. The fire caused about $500 in damage.

“We’re all very devastated,” Friends North member Rose Clement of Grawn told the Traverse City Record-Eagle. “If that fire would’ve spread into the field, this could’ve been horrific.”

Organizers said about 75 participants were camped out after the group’s bike ride, with about 15-20 gathered around a campfire that night a few hundred yards from the toilet.

The Benzie County Sheriff’s Department had no immediate information on the incident.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) – A Lutheran church here ordained an openly gay pastor on Sunday, July 25.

Jay Wiesner will be installed at Bethany Lutheran Church next month. It was the Twin Cities’ third ordination of an openly gay pastor from an Evangelical Lutheran Church in America congregation.

ELCA policy forbids the ordination of anyone in a same-sex relationship unless they practice celibacy.

Bishop Craig Johnson of the ELCA Minneapolis Synod did not attend the ceremony and in the past has not officially recognized a local lesbian pastor.

Johnson could impose sanctions against Bethany, from a reprimand to removing the church as an official ELCA congregation and firing its pastor, said the Rev. Steven Benson.

Benson said he does not know what, if anything, Johnson might do.

ST. LOUIS (AP) – One of 13 candidates vying for Rep. Dick Gephardt’s 3rd District congressional seat has dropped out of the race, saying he hasn’t captured wide enough support.

Mike Evans, 25, of DeSoto, a self-described progressive populist, said he would endorse fellow Democrat Jeff Smith, a political science instructor at Washington University.

Evans claimed that he was the first openly gay candidate to run for Congress in Missouri. He said he had gained support from many gay and lesbian voters but not enough from the larger community.

“We thought, why not take the momentum and support we have and give it to another progressive candidate,” said Evans, who has had his own business, served in the military and worked on the presidential campaigns of Gephardt and Wesley Clark.

“Jeff has been a real leader on equal rights,” he said. “He has the energy, the funds and the broad base of support, and I think he’s going to be our next congressman.”

The 12 candidates remaining in the race include nine Democrats, two Republicans and a Libertarian.

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) – Supporters of a North Dakota constitutional amendment to limit marriage to heterosexual couples say they have collected more than enough petition signatures for their campaign to put the issue to a November vote.

Only 25,688 signatures are needed to put the amendment on the statewide ballot this fall, but the North Dakota Family Alliance’s website, which posts updated signature totals daily, said the petition had 38,457 signatures as of 5:40 p.m. on Monday, July 26.

The petition may have more than 40,000 names by the time it is submitted to Secretary of State Al Jaeger’s office.

“I never had any anxiety in regards to collecting the signatures,” Kindel said. “I have felt very confident since day one that we were going to easily surpass our goal.”

Robert Uebel, chairman of Equality North Dakota, a gay-rights group that opposes the amendment, said the news was disappointing.

“On the other hand, we also welcome the opportunity to make our case to the people of North Dakota,” Uebel said.

Supporters of the amendment have been circulating petitions since early June. The amendment says: “Marriage consists only of the legal union between a man and a woman. No other domestic union, however denominated, may be recognized as a marriage, or given the same or substantially equivalent legal effect.”

It is intended to block North Dakota recognition of same-sex marriages. North Dakota law already bars state recognition of any same-sex marriage performed outside the state, and opponents of the amendment say that makes the amendment unnecessary.

Similar items will be on ballots this summer and fall in Oregon, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Montana, Oklahoma, Missouri, Louisiana and Utah.

In Michigan, citizen groups opposed to same-sex marriage have submitted more than the required number of voter signatures to place a proposed amendment on the ballot. The petition is under review by state officials. A petition drive is still under way in Ohio.

In North America, only Massachusetts and some Canadian provinces license same-sex marriages.

HUNTINGTON, W. Va. (AP) – Huntington City Council has defeated a proposal that would have barred the city from recognizing same-sex marriages, saying the ordinance would do nothing more than duplicate state law.

The ordinance, sponsored by Councilmember Tom McCallister, failed on a 7-4 vote.

The proposal would have defined marriage as a union between a man and a woman and included criminal penalties of up to 30 days in jail and a $500 fine.

A state law containing that definition was adopted in 2000. The state Defense of Marriage Act also states that same-sex marriages recognized in other states will not be recognized in West Virginia.

The proposed city ordinance drew comments from about 30 members of the public and council members, who debated the ordinance for about two hours.

Those who spoke in favor of the ordinance said the council would send a message that it realizes the importance of marriage and protects the existence of traditional families, while opponents said the proposal would instill hate and discrimination into the city’s law books.

“We’ve wasted an awful lot of time on this issue when we could be dealing with a lot more important things,” Councilmember Larry Patterson said.