Among other embarrassing aspects of the whole thing was the fact that I was required to get about a half dozen reference letters from various persons who had known me for many years. This re- quired telling these people the whole story and asking them not only to write me a letter of recommendation but to keep the matter secret from my parents.

At the trial it became very evident that the letter which I had writ- ten was not really the reason I was brought to trial, rather it was just a mechanism to get me before a judge. The PO and the DA knew that I'd have to plead guilty to sending the letter both because I'd admitted sending it and because of my family. They also knew that I would therefore be put on probation and that the judge could im- pose almost any conditions he wanted to for the probation. So when the judge asked the DA about the case the latter went into long harangue about the kind of thing that was being put in the mails and ended up asking that my box be ordered closed and that Transvestia be banned from the mails. The judge turned and asked me what I thought of this. I told him that I could see no reason why this should be done since there had never been anything obscene, indecent, porno- graphic or whatever in it and that it had saved a number of mar- riages and prevented several suicides. He turned back to the DA for his comment and the DA went thru the same routine again. The judge said, "if you feel that strongly about it why don't you take legal action on it?" The DA said "we can't." The judge then replied “Well, if you can't do it why are you trying to get me into the act?” The upshot was that since I had pleaded guilty to the letter he had no choice but to sentence me, which he did, to 3 years in the federal penitentiary, suspended, on 5 years probation.

That was a considerable shock to me as under the probation rules, you are not permitted to break ANY law even if unrelated to that for which you are on probation. At that time there was an ordinance in Los Angeles prohibiting "masquerading in the clothing of the opposite sex." Thus my days out in the world appeared to be over. Naturally I was quite depressed about this. My attorney rescued me by suggesting that I give lectures to service clubs and he fixed up the first with his own Kiwanis Club and I took it from there. I guess I've given nearly 100 such talks since that time. If he had not come up with that solution I often wonder what would have become of me. I was so used to being Virginia in public that I don't know whether I could have held together under such "house arrest."

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