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Roanoke Bar Victim Recalled With Smiles
By Michael Laris
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, September 28, 2000

Page A10

ROANOKE, Sept. 27 –– There were supposed to be anti-gay protests, and there weren't. It was supposed to be sad, and Danny Overstreet's friends and family did their best to make sure that didn't happen either.

About 800 people came to say goodbye to Overstreet, who was fatally shot in a gay bar Friday night. An anti-gay religious activist from Topeka, Kan., Fred Phelps, planned to picket. But mourners said prayer kept him away.

Instead, Overstreet's friends made today's funeral service a celebration of his life. "In the obituary, it said his laugh was infectious," said the Rev. Catherine Houchins, pastor of the largely gay and lesbian Metropolitan Community Church, who led the service. "We continue his laughter as we share joy with one another."

Five days after Overstreet was shot and killed after hugging a buddy, his friends filled themselves with memories of the buoyant man whose warmth and belly laugh made him stand out.

When the gunman walked into the Backstreet Cafe and fired on Overstreet and six other patrons moments after telling a witness he wanted to "waste some faggots," Overstreet became the latest high-profile example of anti-gay violence and sparked calls for federal hate crimes legislation to be amended to include sexual orientation.

What friends described as Overstreet's charming flamboyance has made him a complicated symbol because he happily embraced some of the most pervasive stereotypes about gay men. But friends say Overstreet liked himself that way, and so did they. And they called for him to be remembered for how he lived, not how he died.

"Gay as well as straight, there are people happy just to be happy," said Kathy Caldwell, who was at the Backstreet and was shot through the hand and shoulder.

So friends remembered the Danny Overstreet who brought his champagne-colored poodle, Friday, to work in a tiny, leopard-skin coat; who made the best egg-and-mustard potato salad his fellow Verizon operators had ever had -- not too dry, not too runny; and who, as a former beautician, frequently informed women in the office when they needed to get their roots dyed.

"He'd say, 'Okay girl, it's time for you to make that appointment,' " remembered Arleta Early, who sat in the cubicle across from Overstreet at Verizon's Roanoke headquarters.

Friends in the home service and complaints division, where he worked, offered a photograph of an open-armed Overstreet wearing a smile and a headset in his rose-colored cubicle.

They talked about how even the self-consciously "macho" guys in the office cracked up at Overstreet's constant antics.

Like the way he would take his poodle to breakfast in the morning at the Western Sizzlin and sneak him sausage links, or that time when Overstreet sent Early's Chihuahua, Tequila, mini-bones from his dog for Valentine's Day.

"He'd say, 'Hey Toots. What's going on?' He loved that expression," said Judy Scearce, 62, his supervisor, who broke into tears as she remembered Overstreet.

Scearce said Overstreet seemed entirely comfortable in his own skin, laughing when customers would mistake his high-pitched, effeminate voice on the line for a "Ms. Overstreet."

"He said, 'I don't care what they call me,' " Scearce said.

Overstreet was described as a loving and devoted person who counseled friends when they broke up with their partners and was intensely devoted to caring for his ill mother. He had just found her a new home in Roanoke and was planning a trip to take her to see relatives in North Carolina.

Family members have spent recent days rummaging through scrapbooks of Overstreet's life. He was born in nearby Bedford and moved to Bridgeton, N.J., where he graduated from high school before going to work at the casinos in Atlantic City. They also have been marveling at images of Overstreet as a child.

"We were looking at his picture last night. He looked the same way as a kid that he did as an adult," said Deb Smith, who lives with Overstreet's sister, Darlene, and who helped the family prepare for the funeral. "You can tell from the twinkle in his eye that he always had that kind of spirit."

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Rampage Tears Open Lives
After Gay Bar Shooting, Roanoke Struggles With Attitudes

By Michael Laris
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, September 27, 2000

Page A01

ROANOKE, Sept. 26 –– John Collins is lying in a hospital bed thinking about the bullet that tore through the front of his stomach, ripped through his colon and shot out his hip. He is thinking about his dead friend, Danny Overstreet, whose last grasp was around Collins's legs after a gunman shot seven people in a gay bar Friday.

He is also thinking about his job at Berglund Chevy.

"I feel like now I have no job," he said. "It's going to be extremely difficult to work with the same guys who just last week were saying, 'Look at this hot girl and that one.' I was living a lie. I know what they think about gay people. But I had to put food on the table."

Collins and other residents of this southwestern Virginia city say they are struggling to remake their lives and their community after Ronald Gay, a man with a history of mental problems, came to town and told a witness that he wanted to "waste some faggots" minutes before gunfire erupted in the Backstreet Cafe.

Police arrested Gay several blocks away and say that he said he shot the bar patrons because of his anger at a life of snickers about his last name.

Gay's brother said schizophrenia and rage at marital problems and a land dispute caused him to snap. But no matter what sparked the shooting, the effect is being felt in this gritty former railroad town that sees itself as the "capital of the Blue Ridge."

"Southerners have pride regardless of our sexual orientation, and we don't want things like this happening," said the Rev. Catherine Houchins, pastor of the largely gay and lesbian Metropolitan Community Church.

She has led vigils mourning Overstreet with hundreds of participants and one oft-repeated message: "We are not going back in the closet. We are not going to walk around in fear."

For Collins, that's easier said than done.

"I'm struggling now with the idea of what I'll have to face when I go back to work," he said. "No one knew my personal business. It's a whole new circumstance on top of losing one of my best friends."

Back at Berglund Chevy, where Collins works in shipping and receiving, employees acknowledged some soul-searching after the shooting but said their opinion of Collins won't change.

"If you can come here and do your job, I don't care if you're black, white, pink, gay or straight," said owner Bruce Farrell, who called Collins a "good, dependable, loyal employee."

Still, Collins's whole world was shaken by the shooting. "When I went over there, I might have been a little bouncy, for lack of a better word," Collins said about that night at the Backstreet. He gave Overstreet a hug, which may have set off the shooter. "I guess if that guy was trying to kill a queer, he found one in me," Collins said.

He now has a colostomy bag hanging from his side, and it will be months before he knows whether his colon will function again.

Freeda Cathcart, president of the Roanoke chapter of the National Organization for Women, said the city is experiencing something of a "culture clash" because of the shooting. "You feel like you are in a small town, but . . . here in the hills of Southwest Virginia, we really are a diverse community, and there is some backlash," she said.

She brought her two children to the sky-blue-and-gray-tiled Backstreet Cafe at midnight the day after the slaying to demonstrate that she is not afraid, she said. The boys, 8 and 10, played with the molten wax from the burning memorial candles.

Police say the men and women who were swaying to the rock and country tunes when gunfire sounded at Backstreet have proved to be unusually cooperative witnesses.

When Roanoke has seen bar violence before, including a shooting in a straight bar in recent years, "we just have a lot of people who say, 'I didn't see anything,' or 'I wasn't there,' " said Lt. William L. Althoff, head of the Roanoke police department's Criminal Investigations Unit.

"That just wasn't the case here," Althoff said. "Here are some folks who may have some concerns in the society about labeling--'Oh my God, what if people know I was there?'--but most of them have been willing to assist the police with prosecuting this man."

Others turned to disco for a symbolic statement. Just 24 hours after the shooting at Backstreet, about 300 people poured into the area's other gay bar, a 22-year-old, lavender-fronted establishment down the street from Backstreet called The Park. They danced to Madonna's new single and Prince's "When Doves Cry." At midnight, they turned off the tunes and held a moment of silence.

"As flamboyant as Danny was, he went out with a bang, damn it," said Larry Smith, who knew Danny Overstreet since 1981. "All of us have to unite and do some good out of this. . . . It's going to put us on the map. It's going to do nothing but make us stronger, I tell you that."

Although such defiance has been common in the days since the shooting, so too has another, more fearful vein.

"It could have been us," said the office manager at The Park, who requested anonymity. He said the club had just half of its regular Saturday clientele, which is usually split about 60 percent gay and 40 percent straight. The club requires that patrons hand over their IDs before they are buzzed through a security door.

"Everybody's concerned," said the club's owner, who also asked not be identified. "There's very little you can do about it but think about how lucky we've been all these years."

Concern about the reduced sense of security has spilled beyond Roanoke's gay community. Ann Sheehan is a married mother of two and says she is concerned both about her gay friends and her city.

"On an intellectual level, you can say it's just one crazy lone gunman who had a tough life. But on another level, the safe places people created for themselves don't feel as safe anymore. It's going to take time to find those safe places again," she said. "We're in the Bible Belt. There are plenty of people who think God hates fags and they might be better off dead."

Sheehan said that she fears Roanoke may be turned into some kind of "ground zero" for fringe Christian activists like the Rev. Fred Phelps of Topeka, Kan., who said he plans to picket Overstreet's funeral Wednesday just as his group did in 1998 after the kidnapping and death of University of Wyoming student Matthew Shepard.

Phillip Whitaker has been pastor at Roanoke's small Brambleton Baptist Church for 22 years. He said he agrees with Phelps's goals but said that Overstreet's funeral is the "wrong venue" for protest.

"I think it would close the door forever on influencing those people. I agree that the lifestyle is wrong. I have no apologies for saying it's sinful. It's a destructive lifestyle. I just think that protesting at a funeral is an inappropriate way to express that," he said.

Whitaker said he hopes his "Biblical approach," which includes attempting one-on-one ministering, will be a more effective method for telling gay men that "God can change your lives" after Friday's shooting.

"Most of the Christians I know in the area are as appalled at what happened as we are at the homosexual lifestyle," Whitaker said.

Such comments drew a quick reply from other religious leaders. "Some of the responses have been less than respectful and loving," said Tom Bryant, president of the Roanoke Valley Ministers Conference, an interfaith group of Christian, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish and other faiths.

The common theme throughout Roanoke is a turn inward. Beth Sample, the secretary at Collins's Chevy dealership, has lived in the city on and off for nearly 50 years. She said she is relieved that Gay, who had been living in the Roanoke area for about a year and is now charged with first-degree murder, is from elsewhere.

"I'm glad he's not from Roanoke. I don't think we're that prejudiced," she said.

Then she whispered, "God, I hope not."

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Suspect Not Homophobic, Brother Says
Man in Gay Bar Shooting Has Psychiatric Record

By Leef Smith and Michael Laris
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, September 26, 2000

Page B01

Ronald Edward Gay had no issues with homosexuals but rather has been beset with problems since returning from the Vietnam War, has suffered because of several recent stressful events and stopped taking his anti-depressant medication, Gay's brother said yesterday.

William Gay, 51, said his brother, who has been charged with killing a man at a gay bar in Roanoke, had been hospitalized in the 1980s for post-traumatic stress disorder and was later diagnosed with schizophrenia.

Gay, 54, recently stopped taking his medication and complained about how he was being treated by his veterans hospital, his brother said. Added to lingering legal disputes over family property in Canada, a recently failed marriage--at least his fifth--and a house fire, problems seemed to take their toll, William Gay said.

"He seemed to be coming unglued," Gay said. "I believe he just snapped."

Roanoke police say Ronald Gay asked for directions to a gay bar Friday and walked into Backstreet Cafe and opened fire with a 9mm handgun. He was arrested minutes later.

During an interview with investigators, Ronald Gay said he fired the shots because he had long resented the derogatory comments people made about his surname and said some of his children had changed their last name because of such jokes, said Lt. William L. Althoff. Gay said he was trying to get rid of homosexuals, said Althoff, head of the criminal investigations unit of the Roanoke City Police Department.

Gay made his first court appearance yesterday and sat quietly, glancing occasionally at his clasped hands. He was found indigent, and his case was assigned to a public defender. A preliminary hearing was set for Oct. 16.

Roanoke Commonwealth's Attorney Donald Caldwell said yesterday that he expected to bring additional charges before a grand jury Monday. Police said those might include six counts of malicious wounding and seven counts of using a firearm in the commission of a felony.

Authorities said they expected Gay's defense to request a ruling on his competency. "He was able to tell us where he was," Althoff said. "He knew what he had done, and he knew the seriousness of what he had done. He said he had 'come from the fag bar and blew 'em away.' "

Killed in the shooting was Danny Lee Overstreet, 43, of Roanoke, who was hit in the chest. Also shot were Iris Page Webb, 41, who was hit in the neck, and five people who suffered less severe injuries: John W. Collins, 39; Susan S. Smith, 45; Kathy S. Caldwell, 36; Linda R. Conyers, 41; and Joel I. Tucker, 40. All the victims are from the Roanoke area.

Police found Gay's gun and jacket in a nearby trash can. They also found a black nylon holster and eight shell casings. Officers found a receipt for the gun in Gay's possession. It was purchased last October at a licensed gun dealership in the Roanoke area, police said.

"He says he put [the gun and his jacket] in a trash can because he didn't want to hurt a policeman," Althoff said.

William Gay said his brother has never expressed anger toward gay men or lesbians, but he suffered in the Marines because of his surname. Intensely proud of his family, his brother never considered changing his name, William Gay said.

Instead, he said his brother wrote to the president in the 1980s asking that homosexuals stop using the word "gay" to describe their sexual orientation. William Gay said his brother hand-delivered the letter to the White House.

"I don't think he disliked" homosexuals, Gay said, adding that his brother has dealt with homosexuality and bisexuality in those close to him without issue.

Police said they searched the motel room Gay had rented, as well as the campsite where he had been staying. "That search, conducted the night of the offense, did not produce any anti-gay literature in his possession, nor has any information been developed to date linking Ronald Gay with any anti-gay group or individual," police said in a statement.

William Gay said his brother's problems began when he returned from Vietnam with the deaths of fellow soldiers etched deeply in his mind. The trigger for additional difficulties was a protracted dispute with the Canadian Department of National Defense, which took 400 acres of his family's land, he said. Ronald Gay began to slowly deteriorate until he checked himself into a Tennessee hospital in 1986 for treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder, his brother said.

Phil Budahn, a spokesman for the Department of Veterans Affairs in Washington, confirmed that Gay had been a patient at the Salem Veterans Medical Center. Gay was last seen at the hospital April 26, Budahn said. On July 11, Gay called the hospital to cancel appointments and to say he was moving to Florida, he said.

He would not discuss Gay's diagnosis or treatment, citing privacy statutes.

Gay was married at least five times, according to Florida records, and separated from his last wife within the past year. A loner and a staunch anti-communist, Gay moved from central Florida to the mountains above Roanoke a year ago and would visit the city and stay in a motel when it got too cold to spend the night in his tent, his brother said.

Jimmy Nichols, a cabdriver who took Gay on and off the mountain eight times in the past month, said Gay was upset about his marriage and spoke angrily about the Canadian land dispute. "He was mad that he had to live like a pauper when he said he should have millions of dollars," Nichols said. "He was stressed out."

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'Gay' Name Long Irked Man Held in Bar Slaying
By Michael Laris and Michael D. Shear
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, September 25, 2000

Page A01

Ronald Edward Gay, a 53-year-old man staying in a motel in Roanoke, has told police that he shot seven people in a gay bar in that city's downtown because of longstanding anger at the jokes people made about his last name, the lead investigator in the case said yesterday.

Gay has been charged with first-degree murder in the Friday night shooting at Backstreet Cafe, in which one person was killed and six others wounded.

"He admits to shooting people. He said he was shooting people to get rid of, in his term, 'faggots,' " said Lt. William L. Althoff, head of the criminal investigations unit of the Roanoke City Police Department.

Althoff said police are not aware of any "defining moment or particular incident" that might have precipitated the shooting. Gay told investigators that he had long resented the comments people made about his name, and he said some of his children had changed their last name because of the stress brought on by jokes, Althoff said.

"He told us people made fun of his name. . . . He told us that he was upset about that," Althoff said.

Police videotaped Gay's statement, and it will be submitted as evidence against him. Gay remains in custody and is to be arraigned today.

Gay moved to the Roanoke area about a year ago from central Florida. Acquaintances and former neighbors said he exhibited no outward signs of anger toward gay people. But they described a man haunted by his service in the Vietnam War, struggling to cope with the impact of several divorces and beset by tragedies that included his home burning down this summer.

Guests who stayed in a room next to Gay's at the Roanoke motel said that he talked about death just hours before the shooting and gave them his room key before he left Friday night, saying they could have his belongings. One guest, Kay Lawrence, said Gay told her "to watch the 8 a.m. news if he did not return."

Killed in the shooting was Danny Lee Overstreet, 43, of Roanoke, who was hit in the chest. Also shot were Iris Page Webb, 41, who was hit in the neck and is listed in critical condition at Roanoke Memorial Hospital, and five people who suffered injuries that were less severe: John W. Collins, 39; Susan S. Smith, 45; Kathy S. Caldwell, 36; Linda R. Conyers, 41; and Joel I. Tucker, 40. All the victims are from the Roanoke area.

Shortly before midnight Friday, Gay walked into Backstreet Cafe, where about 50 people were drinking and dancing. Minutes earlier, he had stopped outside another downtown bar and asked an employee for directions to the nearest gay bar, police said.

"He started asking me where the closest gay bar was, so I figured that was his thing. I directed him . . . to the bar I knew about," said the employee, who declined to give his name. He said Gay then showed him a handgun. "He said he was going to 'waste some faggots.' It was just this crazy, off-the-wall rant," the employee said, adding that he quickly told co-workers to call 911.

Police confirmed that they received the warning about Gay, and they broadcast his description on the police radio shortly before the call came in about a shooting at Backstreet Cafe.

Collins, who was shot in the stomach, said that Gay had been sitting near him in the bar and seemed to be set off by a hug between Collins and Overstreet, who were good friends.

"He stood up as I was letting go of the hug," Collins said of Gay, "and he was turning and he was also reaching into his black trench coat. I thought that looked strange, with Columbine and all that. I saw the gun come out of his pocket. . . . Everything was like in a millionth of a second."

Collins said he remembers being hit, then seeing the shooter fire at Overstreet and into the crowd.

After the shooting, Gay walked calmly out of the bar, took off his coat and wrapped the 9mm handgun in it before tossing the bundle in a trash can, police said. He was arrested a few blocks away.

Gay rights activists decried the shooting and said they hoped it would persuade Congress to pass a pending hate crimes bill that would cover acts of violence committed against an individual on the basis of sexual orientation. Activists were to meet last night at a Roanoke church to focus attention on the bill.

President Clinton has made enacting the bill a top priority for the fall, but Republican congressional leaders have said they intend to strip the provision from the annual Defense Department authorization bill, which is in negotiations.

Overstreet, a telephone operator, was described by friends as a compassionate, helpful and optimistic person. "Every morning when he got up to go to work, he was happy," said Mark Loudermilk, a former roommate.

Friends said that Overstreet had a loud, recognizable laugh and doted on his dog, a poodle named Friday. He lived alone with his dog in a two-story brick house.

Michelle Walker, 32, lives a few houses from Overstreet's address. "He never had a whole lot of company," Walker said. "He was always quiet. He never bothered anybody. He was a normal person. He's got everything fixed up--the flowers so neat, the house is absolutely immaculate. . . . How could somebody be so hateful?"

Gay, who has been married five times, according to Florida marriage records, told neighbors that he suffered from post-traumatic stress syndrome because of his service in Vietnam and that he was treated in Veterans Affairs hospitals. He did not work and lived on military disability payments, acquaintances said.

Gay married Laura Howell in February 1994 and divorced her five years later, records show. The couple lived in Citrus Springs, Fla., with their son, Kyle. Neighbors said that Gay also had older children from previous marriages.

Howell, now remarried and known as Laura Ramsey, told the Roanoke Times that Gay walked out on the family in 1999. After the divorce, Gay moved briefly to a rental house in Citrus Springs.

Dan Chun, who lives near the house Gay rented, said, "I talked to him a couple of times. He said he was under psychiatric care. He had some flashbacks."

In summer 1999, Gay suddenly announced that he was leaving Florida to go to Virginia, said another neighbor, Robert Johnston.

After Gay moved into a small rental home east of Roanoke on the shores of Smith Mountain Lake, his troubles escalated.

Soon after moving in, Gay severely burned his legs while using gasoline to burn a pile of leaves. He told fire officials that he was burning his divorce papers, according to Capt. Larry Dellis, of the Saunders Volunteer Fire Co. and Huddleston Rescue Squad.

In May of this year, Gay called the fire department and said his home was on fire. When firefighters arrived, Gay was sitting on a neighbor's steps with a suitcase and a bottle of alcohol, said Fire Chief Sherman Dellis, of the Saunders Volunteer Fire Co.

Gay's home was destroyed in the fire, which was later blamed on a clothes dryer.

After the house burned, Gay moved to a friend's trailer in a campground near Roanoke. The day of the shooting, he checked into Jefferson Motor Lodge in Roanoke.

Lawrence and a friend, Virgil Glover, were staying in a room next to Gay's. After Gay and Glover had shared cigarettes on the walkway outside the rooms, Gay gave Glover his room key, Glover recalled, and said that Glover could have his belongings if he didn't return by the next morning.

Lawrence said that Gay had a memorable way of introducing himself.

"He said his name was Ronald Gay. He said his last name is not what it sounds like and 'I'm not gay.' " Lawrence said.

When he left the motel Friday night, "he said, 'I'm going to go get a hamburger and watch fireworks,' " Lawrence recalled.

"He kind of winked at me when he said it. . . . I said, 'Fireworks?' He just kind of looked at me with a grin."

Staff writers David S. Fallis and Juliet Eilperin contributed to this report.

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Gay Bar Gunfire Kills 1, Hurts 6
Suspect Arrested in Roanoke
Associated Press
Sunday, September 24, 2000

Page C01

ROANOKE, Sept. 23 –– A man who said he wanted to shoot gay people opened fire in a gay bar in Roanoke late Friday, killing one person and wounding six, one critically, police said.

The man walked into the Backstreet Cafe shortly before midnight, ordered a beer and, after a few minutes, pulled a handgun from his coat and began firing, Roanoke police spokeswoman Shelly Alley said today. There were about 25 people in the bar at the time. One of them, Danny Lee Overstreet, 43, died in the bar, police said.

Ronald Edward Gay, 53, was charged with murder, and officials are investigating the shooting as a hate crime. He was being held without bond in the Roanoke jail.

Police said Gay had been in another bar earlier Friday and asked where the gay bar was. He told witnesses he wanted to shoot some gay people, police said. A witness gave him directions to the Backstreet Cafe, six or seven blocks away, and then called police.

After the shooting, police found Gay near the bar. Officers also found a 9mm pistol believed used in the shooting in a trash can. Alley said Gay gave no motive when questioned by officers.

David Elliot, communications director for the Washington-based National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, called the shooting "tragic, abominable and infuriating" and said it "paints a very clear picture as to why we must demand that Congress pass hate-crimes legislation before it adjourns next month."

Identification on the suspect listed his home town as Citrus Springs, Fla., but Alley said Gay had been living in the Roanoke area for about a year.

Gay was named in a warrant in Citrus County, Fla., for trespassing in July, and faced an injunction for domestic violence. Both are misdemeanors. He did not have a record in Roanoke, Alley said.

The victim's sister, Darlene Overstreet, said her brother, who was gay, often visited the Backstreet Cafe. He worked as a telephone operator and lived alone with his dog, a poodle.

"He was a wonderful person. He helped everybody," she said. "He just stopped by to have a beer, that's all."

Flowers, cards and balloons were placed outside the bar throughout the day today, as five of the victims remained hospitalized.

Iris Page Webb, 41, of Dublin, Va., was listed in critical condition with a gunshot wound to the neck.

The remaining victims, all from Roanoke, are John W. Collins, 39, in serious condition, and Susan S. Smith, 45, Joel I. Tucker, 40, and Kathy S. Caldwell, 36, all in stable condition.

Another victim, Linda R. Conyers, 41, was released from the hospital after being treated for gunshot wounds.

About 200 people gathered tonight at the bar for a candlelight vigil.

The Rev. Catherine Houchins, pastor of Metropolitan Community Church of the Blue Ridge, which has an outreach to gay men and lesbians, said she has never experienced harassment in Roanoke. She said several people who called her today made comments such as, "I can't believe this happened here."

Houchins said a woman who was at the bar told her that she heard no anti-gay statements from the gunman.

Elliot, of the Gay and Lesbian Task Force, said members of the group were en route to Roanoke. "Sometimes when something like this happens in small towns and rural areas, local activists think that they are isolated and all alone," he said. "We are going down to tell them that they are not alone, that there is a whole national movement behind them."

Staff writer Michael Laris contributed to this report.

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