Biography
One of six gay men arrested by undercover LAPD officers during the January 1, 1967 raid on the Black Cat Tavern in Silver Lake, Los Angeles. Officers entered the bar minutes after the New Year's Eve midnight kiss and brutally beat patrons and bartenders. Convicted under California Penal Code §647(a) for lewd conduct (kissing another man in public); forced to register as a sex offender for life. The arrests prompted the February 11, 1967 Black Cat protest — one of the earliest organized LGBT public demonstrations in U.S. history, two and a half years before Stonewall. Baker and Talley's appeal reached the California Supreme Court, which upheld their convictions; the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case.
