
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, March 30, 1992                   TAG: 9203300118
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: A-6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: SPOTSYLVANIA                                LENGTH: Short

GAY-RIGHTS SIT-IN STAGED AT RESTAURANT

Gay-rights supporters staged a sit-in at Cracker Barrel on Sunday to protest the restaurant chain's firing of homosexual employees.

About 100 participants came from Washington, Richmond, Norfolk and New York to join the sit-in, said Gregory King, spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign Fund, a Washington-based gay and lesbian political organization.

Officers from the Spotsylvania Sheriff's Department arrested one man, who was not part of the demonstration, and charged him with trespassing.

Tim McCarthy of Front Royal, a reporter for Gay Cable Network, said the restaurant manager told him to remove his videocamera from the restaurant. He refused.

"I personally was never asked to leave the premises, yet I was arrested for trespassing," said McCarthy, 34. "This is absurd that police should be used to arrest members of the press."

McCarthy is scheduled for a May 21 hearing in Spotsylvania General District Court.

A telephone call to Sheriff Thomas Waddy was not immediately returned.

Demonstrators occupied tables at the restaurant without ordering food.

by CNB