 Professor Herrick, can you please describe your educational background? Yes, I received my doctorate in social psychology from the University of California. My dissertation focused on heterosexuals attitudes towards lesbians and gay men. In turning your opinions, Dr. Herrick, what is sexual orientation? Sexual orientation is a term we use to describe an enduring sexual, romantic, or intensely affectional attraction to men, to women, or to both men and women. It's used to refer to an identity or a sense of self that is based on one's enduring patterns of attraction. Is homosexuality considered a mental disorder? No, there were empirical studies that had been conducted that had failed to support the view of homosexuality as a mental illness. Okay, looking at the study, the definition and scope of sexual orientation. It says, we suggest the term sexual preference is misleading as it assumes conscious or deliberate choice and may trivialize the depth of the psychological process involved. We recommend the term sexual orientation because findings indicate that homosexual's feelings are a basic part of an individual's psyche and are established much earlier than conscious choice would indicate. Do you agree with that? Yes, yes I do. I was a precocious kid, so one day I ended up looking up the word homosexual in the dictionary, something along the lines of romantic attraction between members of the same sex, and it slowly dawned on me that that's what I was. Given your prior testimony about homosexuals, how did you feel when you realized that you were gay? Well, once I realized what a homosexual was, I was scared by that. I realized this was bad news for me, so I hid it as far away from everyone as I could. Around this time, did anyone talk to you about being gay? When I was in seventh grade, I remember being taunted about being gay. I was called a faggot. I was called a homo, a queer, or even just gay. It was scary going into that building, realizing these kids were taunting me with a word that was so close to the truth. I would go home crying. Did your parents ever find out that you were gay? When I was 13 years old, my parents discovered my journal, and for the first time I had admitted to myself that I was gay, I had actually written those words, and they found that and read it. And what happened when they found the journal? They were very upset. They were yelling. I remember my mother looking at me and telling me that I was going to burn in hell. It was shocking. I never heard anything like that from my mother. I mean, you don't get much worse than internal damnation. And what is North? North stands for the National Association for Reparative Therapy of Homosexuality. It's a reversal therapy organization based in Encino, California. How long were you at North? About a year and a half. From what ages? 14 to 16. During that time that you were at North, how was your home life? My mother would tell me that she hated me. Once she told me that she wished she had had an abortion instead of a gay son. She told me she wished I had been born with Down syndrome or had been mentally retarded. Who did you meet with at North? I met with Dr. Joseph Nicolosi. Where would you meet with Mr. Nicolosi? I did actually fly out to California to do in-person sessions. I recall Nicolosi saying that homosexuality is incompatible with what God wants for you. And your parents want you to change and that this is a bad thing. Were you given any advice on how you would be able to suppress your homosexuality in these therapy sessions? I remember it as a general admonishment, but not a specific technique, no. No further questions, Your Honor? Dr. Cooper, you may cross-examine. Mr. Kendall, have you ever lived in the state of California? No, I have not. And you didn't have any role in the campaign to oppose Proposition 8, did you? No, I did not. You have never read a scientific study addressing the concept of sexual orientation, isn't that true? That is true. And isn't it also true that you have never studied whether a person's sexual orientation can change throughout the course of his or her lifetime? No, I haven't studied it. And nothing involved in the conversion therapy was your decision. It was all your parents' decision, isn't that true? Yes. At some point during your counseling you communicated to your parents objections to the counseling treatment, but your parents compelled you to go against your will. That's correct. Your only goal for conversion therapy was to survive the experience, isn't that true? Absolutely true. You didn't have the goal of changing your sexual orientation, I'm sorry, correction, you didn't have the goal of changing your sexual attraction, correct? That's correct. Indeed, you admit that you did not truly want to reduce your sexual attraction to persons of the same sex, isn't that true? That is correct. Is my experience that people don't want to go to programs like Narva? Well, you acknowledged in your deposition, did you not that some people report to have effective results in conversion therapy, isn't that true? Yes. No further questions, Your Honor. And was this therapy successful in that you were able to suppress your homosexuality? No, I was just as gay as when I started. While you were in conversion therapy, were you introduced to any people who purported or were purported to you to have successfully undergone conversion therapy? I remember during one of the group therapy sessions, Nicolosi trotted out his perfect patient, the guy who had been cured of his homosexuality and his name was Kelly. Did meeting Kelly have any impact on your views of conversion therapy? I remember once when Nicolosi stepped out of the room, we were talking amongst ourselves and Kelly told me that later that night he was going to a gay bar and that he was essentially just pretending to be cured for the sake of his family. Why did you stop going to reversal therapy? During this whole time, this whole thing, my life had kind of fallen apart. I didn't have the world that I grew up in. My faith, which was very important to me, my family, which was even more important, everything had just kind of stopped and I just couldn't take anymore. And I realized at one point that if I didn't stop going, I wasn't going to survive. What do you mean by that? I probably would have killed myself.