A former Kentucky clerk who refused to challenge marriage licenses to same-sex {couples} has now been ordered to pay $260,000 to cowl the authorized prices of a pair whom she denied almost 10 years in the past.
A federal choose on Thursday ordered former Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis to fork over the six-digit determine, which is in addition to a $100,000 award {that a} jury ordered her to pay to the couple in September.
This new award, issued by U.S. District Judge Daniel Bunning, will cowl $246,026.40 in attorneys’ charges and $14,058.30 in bills that David Ermold and David Moore reported racking up of their lawsuit towards Davis.
Bunning stated he reviewed the attorneys’ detailed time data and thought of charges of inflation earlier than approving the award.
“Given the nature of this case and its lengthy procedural history, the Court finds the hours expended to be reasonable,” he wrote in his opinion.
Liberty Counsel, a conservative Christian group that represented Davis, stated it would enchantment the September verdict towards her as much as the U.S. Supreme Court following this newest ruling. That court docket beforehand declined to listen to an enchantment from Davis’ attorneys within the case in 2020.
“…Davis is not liable for any damages because she was entitled to a religious accommodation from issuing marriage licenses under her name and authority that conflicted with her religious beliefs,” Liberty Counsel stated in an announcement Tuesday.
The choose’s ruling follows Davis denying the couple a wedding license in 2015 below her private perception that marriage is just respectable between a person and a lady. Issuing a license to a same-sex couple as county clerk — whose tasks embrace issuing such licenses ― would violate her beliefs and rights, she argued.
Her refusal, nevertheless, violated the couple’s constitutional rights, Bunning dominated in 2022.
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,” he argued.
Davis was briefly jailed in 2015 over her refusal.
