Kentucky Clerk Kim Davis Ordered To Pay $100,000 To Gay Couple She Denied Marriage License
Image: Kim Davis (left) and David Ermold and David Moore.
Kim Davis, a Kentucky county clerk, who rose to international notoriety, for refusing to marry same-sex couples citing her religious beliefs was ordered to pay $100,000 to a gay couple.
In 2015, the US Supreme Court’s Obergefell v. Hodges judgement made same-sex marriages legal.
Davis, a former county clerk from Kentucky refused to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples and in fact, stopped issuing marriage licenses to all couples.
Davis spent five days in jail for contempt of court, before her office started issuing marriage licenses in her absence.
Gay Couples Sue Davis
Two gay couples David Ermold and David Moore and James Yates and Will Smith, sued Davis for denying them marriage licenses.
A court last year held that Davis had violated the couple’s constitutional rights. The judge ruled that “Davis cannot use her own constitutional rights as a shield to violate the constitutional rights of others while performing her duties as an elected official.”
The district court said that she was personally liable as an elected government official for denying marriage licenses to gay couples.
The jury ordered Davis to pay $50,000 each in damages to Ermold and Moore. Yates and Smith were not awarded any damages.
Davis’ Lawyers To Go To US Supreme Court
Davis’ lawyers said they would file an appeal before the US Supreme Court. “We look forward to appealing this decision and taking this case to the U.S. Supreme Court. Kim Davis has blazed the trail in Kentucky where she has obtained religious freedom for all clerks. Now it is time to extend that freedom to everyone, and that is what Liberty Counsel intends to do,” Liberty Counsel Founder and Chairman Mat Staver said in a statement.
According to Liberty Counsel, Davis was not liable for any damages “because she was entitled to a religious accommodation from issuing marriage licences under her name and authority that conflicts with her religious beliefs”.
Davis’ lawyers said that the appeal had the potential to go to the Supreme Court, where they would also argue that the 2015 judgments legalising gay marriages in the US should be overturned.
