powerful men who, in return, provided Cohn with assistance. One of them was New York's Francis Cardinal Spellman, whose own alleged homosexuality has been a subject of controversy in the Catholic Church. During the years of debate over the passage of New York's first gay rights bill, Cohn would align himself with the Archdiocese of New York and express his conviction that "homosexual teachers are a grave threat to our children". Although Cohn always denied his homosexuality in public, he had a few known boyfriends over the course of his life, including his assistant Russell Eldridge, who died from AIDS in 1984, and Peter Fraser, Cohn's partner for the last two years of his life, who was 30 years his junior. Speculation about Cohn's sexuality intensified following his death from AIDS in 1986. In a 2008 article published in The New Yorker, Jeffrey Toobin quotes Cohn associate Roger Stone: "Roy was not gay. He was a man who liked having sex with men. Gays were weak, effeminate. He always seemed to have these young blond boys around. It just wasn't discussed. He was interested in power and access." Lavender scare Cohn and McCarthy targeted government officials and cultural figures not only for suspected Communist sympathies, but also for alleged homosexuality. McCarthy and Cohn were responsible for the firing of scores of gay men from government employment, and strong-armed many opponents into silence using rumors of their homosexuality. Former U.S. Senator Alan K. Simpson wrote: "The so-called 'Red Scare' has been the main focus of most historians of that period of time. A lesser-known element…and one that harmed far more people was the witch-hunt McCarthy and others conducted against homosexuals." Sexual blackmail allegations According to New York attorney John Klotz, who had been investigating Cohn on behalf of his client Richard Dupont, Cohn provided protection for a "ring of pedophiles" operating out of Suite 233 at the Plaza Hotel. The ring, Klotz wrote, had "connections to the intelligence community". Some of Cohn's former clients, including Bill Bonanno, son of crime boss Joseph Bonanno, also credit him with having compromising photographs of former FBI director J. Edgar Hoover. Because Hoover knew the pictures existed, Cohn told Bonanno, Hoover feared being blackmailed. Other organized crime figures have corroborated these allegations. Death In 1984, Cohn was diagnosed with AIDS and attempted to keep his condition secret while receiving experimental drug treatment. He participated in