Laurel Hester

Republican congressional candidate Jack Kelly is featured in an Oscar winning documentary.

But it may not be the kind of attention he wants.

The movie, Freeheld, follows the struggle of Laurel Hester, a former Point Pleasant police officer who was dying of cancer, to leave her pension benefits to her same sex life partner, Stacie Andree.

But the couple faced obstacles from the Ocean County Board of Freeholders, and from Kelly in particular. In the movie, Kelly is shown saying that giving the benefits would violate the sanctity of marriage. Towards the end of the film -- after the rest of the board reconsiders and grants pension benefits to same-sex couples -- the camera focuses on the empty seat of Kelly, who did not attend the meeting.

Kelly, however, said that he’s not scared that the movie could drum up donations to Democratic candidate John Adler from the gay community should he be the nominee, or adversely affect his race for the Republican nomination against Chris Myers.

Garden State Equality is celebrating a major victory: an Oscar.  "Freeheld:  The Laurel Hester Story," the film chronicling a dying police officer’s fight for life and Garden State Equality’s fight in the political arena to win death benefits for her partner, won the 2008 Academy Award for Best Short Documentary on Sunday night.  GSE has released a video Hester recorded days before she died, now on the organization’s homepage of , where she speaks of what GSE describes as a “hard-fought victory over the homophobic Ocean County freeholders, who finally caved in and granted the benefits to Lt. Hester’s partner.”

Gusciora Blasts Ocean County Freeholders' Homophobic Statements Over Police Benefits

For release: November 18, 2005
Contact: Press office 609-292-7065

(TRENTON) -- Assembly Majority Leader-designate Bonnie Watson Coleman today urged Ocean County Freeholders to revisit a cancer-victim’s request for domestic partnership benefits.