Village Station police raid
The Village Station police raid was a police raid that targeted the Village Station, a gay bar in Dallas, Texas, United States. The raid occurred on October 25, 1979, and saw several bar patrons arrested for public lewdness while performing a bunny hop dance. The raid and the subsequent court cases involving those arrested are considered an important moment in the LGBT history of Dallas, with the impact it had on the city compared to that of the Stonewall riots of 1969. By the 1970s, Dallas's Oak Lawn neighborhood had become the city's gay village and was home to several nightclubs that catered to the LGBT community. The Village Station was one such bar, having relocated to its present location in mid-1979. Like many of the clubs in the area, it had been the target of repeated police raids and other forms of discrimination, including an arson attack in 1976 that had destroyed its then-location. The 1979 raid, which occurred just before 1 a.m. on October 25, led to the arrest of about ten patrons on charges of public lewdness. While the people who were arrested in similar raids tended to plead guilty to avoid publicity, the Village Station raid