JUST eight years ago was the last time 88-year-old Leslie Peterkin was the victim of a gay hate crime, at a well-known Newcastle beat.
The retired teacher and potter, who plays piano on a regular basis at four Newcastle nursing homes, was parked at Braye Park at the top of Waratah when his car was attacked in broad daylight.
"A blue sedan pulled up beside me and two young ... men got out," Mr Peterkin has told a NSW inquiry into hate crimes against lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and queer (LGBTIQ) people.
"They circled my car, eyeing me off in a menacing way, and then one of them smashed my back windscreen with his fist, of all things.
"It was a clear example of being perceived to be gay just because you happen to be in a place where it is perceived that gay men congregate."
By about 2018, as a result of the number of crimes against gay men, there was quite a lot of police activity in Newcastle, with squad cars driving around and telling people to move on.
"Any sexual activity in a public place, whether heterosexual or homosexual, is an offence, and therefore the police have every right to act if such activity is reported", Mr Peterkin said in his statement to the commission.
However, they should conduct themselves in a professional way. "From my observations that is what they generally do in this day and age," he said.
That was not always the case, Mr Peterkin said, as he gave evidence via audiovisual link on Tuesday from his Newcastle home.
He said he felt guilty for a long time about his homosexuality, and talked about how that was described in offensive terms. He was about 23, he said, when he went to psychiatrist who told him it was ok to be gay, but to "be careful".
That was good advice, Mr Peterkin said, given that gay relationships were still illegal up until 1984.
Visiting beats, as he used to do, was fraught with danger he said, due to two types of risks - 'poofter bashing' as it was then known, or police entrapment, which was also a well known hazard, he said.
He experienced an incident of police entrapment himself one warm night in 1956, he told the commission, coming home from the city. He stopped to use a public toiled at North Sydney Oval when a man in a dark suit came in and stood beside him at the urinal.
The man gestured towards him, and when Mr Peterkin responded, he was grabbed by the cuff of the neck and told "you're under arrest".
He was gripped with fear, he said, but after citing his police sergeant father's name at the police station, he was released.
When asked what he thought of the relationship between NSW police and the gay community now, he said there was a very good rapport between them, from what he could gather, and he hoped that would continue.
"But don't forget homophobia, will always exist," he said. "There will always be a degree of hatred towards members of any minority group, he said. "We all suffer from this kind of hatred, it's a sad human state."
