By: A.

Jordan Rushie
JRushie@RushieLaw.com
Pa. Id. 209066
Rushie Law
2424 East York Street Suite 316
Philadelphia, PA 19125
215.268.3978

Attorneys for Amicus

In the Court of Common Pleas

First Judicial District of Pennsylvania
Commonwealth of
Pennsylvania

Case No. 14055

Docket No. CP-51CR-0014055-2014

v.

Kathryn G. Knott

Assigned Judge: Hon. Roxanne

Covington

Motion for Leave to File Amicus Brief

1. Christopher Sawyer is the author of the blog Philadelinquency,
which is read by thousands of City employees and the public atlarge.
2. Philadelinquency has had a direct hand in changing some of
Philadelphias laws and policies. Sawyer also ran for Sheri of
Philadelphia in 2015 on the Republican ticket. The Sheri is
responsible for the safety and security of the courts where they
sit.
3. Sawyer is openly homosexual.
4. Kathryn Knott attacked a gay couple in Philadelphia's
gayborhood in 2014.
5. For her actions, this Honorable Court sentenced Ms. Knott to
five to ten months jail time.

6. Ms. Knott now moves this Honorable Court to reconsider her

sentence.
7. Kathryn Knotts actions have had a dramatic impact on
Philadelphias LGBT1 community.
8. As a blogger, politician, and member of the LGBT community
Sawyer has a unique perspective on the issue pending before the
court. His brief would assist the Court in its consideration of
reconsideration of the sentencing of Kathryn Knott.
9. Sawyer seeks to assist the Court by highlighting the significance
of Ms. Knotts sentencing to the LGBT community.
10. His contribution is an important, independent analysis of the
issues presented to the court. A copy of the proposed Amicus
Brief is attached to this motion as Exhibit A.
Wherefore, Christopher Sawyer respectfully requests this Honorable
Court to allow him to file an Amicus Brief.
Respectfully Submitted,

"
____________________________________
A. Jordan Rushie
Attorney for Amicus

Lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, and transsexual community

Certificate of Service
I, A. Jordan Rushie, certify that I served a copy of this Motion for
Leave to file an Amicus Brief of the following:

William J. Brennan
1600 Locust Street
Philadelphia, PA 19103
/S/
__________________________________
A. Jordan Rushie
Dated: February 20, 2016


Exhibit A

Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas

Trial Division Criminal

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Case No. 14055

Docket No. CP-51-CR-0014055-2014

vs.

Assigned Judge: Roxanne Covington

Kathryn G Knott

AMICUS CURIAE BREIF OF CHRISTOPHER L. SAWYER

May it Please Your Honor and This Court:
I am a resident of Philadelphia County, in the 31st Ward and 15th Division of
the City of Philadelphia. I have participated in the Trial Division of this
Court as a juror in another criminal case, serving as jury foreman, and I was
the 2015 candidate for Sheriff of Philadelphia County for the Republican
Party. Had I won election in November 2015, my duty as Sheriff would be
the safety and security of this court wherever it may sit.
I am openly homosexual.
Before this court is a Motion of Reconsideration of Sentence for Kathryn G.
Knott, defendant in the above-captioned matter.
This court sentences Ms. Knott to a total of five to ten months incarceration
followed by two years reporting probation. Further, this court divided Ms.
Knotts sentencing counts consecutively, ordered her to pay a $2,000 fine,
court costs, and probation fees. Ms. Knotts reporting probation was also
made transferrable to her county of residence, in Bucks County. Ms. Knott
was further restricted from leaving the Commonwealth yet also barred from
re-entering Philadelphia, save only for matters in relation to her sentencing.
Knotts Participation In The Assault
This court found that Knott wasnt a removed-observer from the assault that
occurred on the night of September 11th, 2014. She physically connected
punches to the victims. Thus the jurors charged with evaluating Knotts role
in the attack on victims Mr. Hesse and Mr. Haught found Ms. Knott had met
the standard for assault in 18 PA C.S. 2701(3).

Sawyer Amicus - Knott - Page 1

Ms. Knott also said that she did not call anyone a faggot, while at the same
time other witnesses testified that she did. The jury did not find Knott to be
believable.
Ms. Knott also stated that she was just trying to calm the situation. No one
other than Ms. Knott or her relatives believes that to be true.
The Commonwealth revealed a fact that Knott failed to disprovetwo
homosexual men were attacked because of their appearance or manner of
speech that caused Knott, and related defendants Kevin Harrigan and Philip
Williams to assault the victims based upon defendants belief that the two
males were homosexual. Their assumption was correct; they were.
After the attack was over, Ms. Knott traveled to Tir Na Nog, a bar in Center
City, to continue with her evening, and her drinking. She did not render
aid. She did not call 911.
If there was any outward indication that Ms. Knott was concerned about the
victims in any way on the evening of September 11, no one noticed it.
Rejection of Plea Agreement
Knott was offered a plea arrangement by this Commonwealth not dissimilar
from the related defendants in this case. Knott, as an ambulatory adult of
this Commonwealth of sound mind, decided on her own volition to request a
full criminal trial. Jurors were called through voir dire, and presumably
jurors were seated for this case who were suitability removed from defendant
Knott.
To what I am sure must have come as a great surprise to Knott, the jury
sustained the charge of simple assault.
18 PA C.S. 2701(3) A person is guilty of simple assault if he: () attempts by
physical menace to put another in fear of an imminent serious bodily injury.
Ms. Knott physically assaulted the victims. The victims sustained costly
injuries.
Knotts Desire To Not Be Punished is Insufficient to Reconsider
Sentence
Ms. Knott selected a trial hoping that should there be any bias against the
victims with the jury, sympathy or bias towards Ms. Knotts background and
upbringing, or confusion over what the standards of 2701(3) are amongst
jurors, this would favor her and she would avoid any sentencing by this court.
This was a calculated decision by the defendant and it failed.
Further, this court did not impose the maximum possible penalty for
defendants proven actions. Ms. Knott reconfirmed her guilt found by the
Sawyer Amicus - Knott - Page 2

jurors at her February 8th, 2016 sentencing allocution where she expressed
remorse.
Your Honor, being sorry for what you have done at the moment of allocution
is woefully insufficient and not a mandatory cause for leniency.
Homophobic Assaults and Homicides in Philadelphia
As Your Honor and this court have become aware, homophobic assaults and
homicides continue to pose a problem in this county. The distribution of
gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered individuals (LGBT) is
proportionally distributed throughout most U.S. populations. The LGBT
population is generally higher than average in large U.S. cities.
The reason why there are more LGBT individuals living in large cities is a
function of homosexual and transgender-identity acceptance among more
rural populations. When and where acceptance has been lower, the pressure
to relocate to a safe haven increases.
I was raised in a rural population of 4,000 people in South Texas, a region
of high participation in the Catholic Church, in a conservatively-rural
Anglo-Hispanic bilingual culture. For some LGBT individuals their ability
to adapt in an environment where hostility to homosexuality is high these
individuals feel tremendous pressure to relocate to an area where they feel
more welcome, more safe, and can find economic opportunity to eke out a
living. The alternative to this is to carefully live a double lifestyle with an
inward private appearance and a public-facing appearance so as to avoid risk.
In the public realm, the affectation for someone forced to make this choice is
in the closet.
Philadelphia is considered to be a safe haven for LGBT people. Throughout
the 20th century and even today, Philadelphia is a refuge for many LGBT
Pennsylvanians who cannot or refuse to adapt into adulthood in their more
rural or suburban environment from whence they came and live a double
lifestyle.
While I did not move to Philadelphia for that reasonliving rural is fine by
me, save for extremely high temperaturesmany homosexual and bisexual
acquaintances of mine relocated in their teens and early 20s to youngadulthood to large metropolitan centers solely to flee their unaccepting
hometowns because they feel that their lives can only be made difficult and
unsafe to remain in their communities of origin.
While LGBT acceptance has remarkably increased throughout the United
States, there continues to remain the risk of homophobic or transphobic
physical violence that is precipitated at random on these people. Such is the
instant case.

Sawyer Amicus - Knott - Page 3

Your Honor, this court sent a message with Ms. Knotts conviction and with
her sentencing: she violated this Commonwealths laws that we all must strive
to abide.
The Effect of Defendants Sentence
The sentence demanded of Ms. Knott sent shockwaves through the general
population and across this nation. Never until now has such a person who so
deliberately and disdainfully expressed her displeasure solely with someones
identity, commit physical assault motivated solely upon that identity in
Philadelphia and she did not escape the consequences which this court is
charged with dispensing. The defiance by defendant of her guilt was
answered in the most concrete of terms by this court.
By Ms. Knotts own hand she has created this intrigue. Her words, her
actions, will be hard for the public to forget. They will be difficult for those
of defendants peers and similarly-minded individuals who consider a
physical assault for the sake of someones sexual orientation to be a nonassault. That assumption has been proven by this court to be myth and the
general population of this Commonwealth now understands it to be so.
This ordeal will haunt Ms. Knott and her family for the remainder of their
days. The sentence delivered by this court was not cruel nor an
overextension. If Ms. Knott wishes to contest the conduct of this court or
continue to question the underlying basis of her charges an appeal is available
to her. Given the amount of time this court asked her to serve in
incarceration, by the time her appeals are exhausted she would have already
completed the incarceration that was demanded.
By removing Knotts incarceration term from this sentence, this court would
also reverse its own attitude towards simple and aggravated assault in the
public sphere. It would communicate clearly to all LGBT people, not just
myself, that there is no justice to be found in Pennsylvania if you are assaulted
and attacked merely because of the gender of who you love or the gender with
which you identify.
18 PA C.S. 2701(3) does not include an escape. It doesnt say except if the
victim is a homosexual or is not of the same gender at time of birth.
Removing Ms. Knotts incarceration term would communicate to everyone in
the gay community that this is what the court believes.
If 18 PA C.S. 2701(3) will not protect myself from harm or homicide
because of my homosexual identity, the only remaining facet of the
Commonwealth penal statute that remains is PA H.R. No. 40 (Printer:
1038) of 2011, the edits made to Title 18 PA C.S. commonly referred to as
the Castle Doctrine, which further strengthens the protection of selfdefense in criminal prosecution.

Sawyer Amicus - Knott - Page 4

What is a gay person in Pennsylvania to do to protect themselves from the

other Ms. Knotts, Mr. Harrigans and Mr. Williamses that LGBT
Pennsylvanians happen to encounter daily? This courts answer surely isnt
go buy a gun.
I beg you to let Defendant Knotts sentencing by this court on February 8,
2016 remain unmodified.

Sawyer Amicus - Knott - Page 5