Justices decline to rule on gay rights
Florist’s appeal sent back to state court in gay marriage case. High court declines to hear ‘Making a Murderer’ case
WASHINGTON— TheSupreme Court signaled Monday that it is unwilling to immediately answer whether a business owner’s religious beliefs can justify refusing gay couples seeking wedding services.
The justices returned to lower courts the case of a Washington state florist who refused to provide a floral arrangement for a longtime customer when he told her it was for his wedding to another man. A unanimous Washington Supreme Court found the florist, Barronelle Stutzman, violated the Washington Law Against Discrimination, a state civil rights law.
The U.S. Supreme Court said the case should be reconsidered in light of its decision earlier this month in favor of Colorado baker Jack C. Phillips, who declined to create a wedding cake for a gay couple.
The cases are similar, but the justices decided Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission on a fact-specific finding: that members of the Colorado Civil Rights Commission had been unfairly hostile to Phillips’s religious justifications.
The state of Washington had argued there was no religious animosity in the court proceedings involving Stutzman and her flower shop, Arlene’s Flowers.
The justices had been holding the case for months and had three choices: grant Stutzman’s petition and hear the case in the term that begins in October; decline the case and leave in place the Washington Supreme Court opinion, which is similar to those in other states with laws that protect on the basis on sexual orientation; or send it back to the state court with instructions to rehear the case in light of the Masterpiece decision.
There is little dispute about the facts of the case. Stutzman had counted Robert Ingersoll as a customer for nearly a decade when he came in one day in 2013 and said he wanted to talk about flowers for his wedding to his
In ruling against florist Barronelle Stutzman longtime companion, Curt Freed. Stutzman said she held his hand and said she had to decline his request because of her “relationship with Jesus Christ.”
“I truly want the best for my friend,” Stutzman wrote in a letter to Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson in 2015. “I’ve also employed and served many members of the LGBT community, and I will continue to do so regardless of what happens with this case.”
Ingersoll and Freed filed suit against Stutzman, as did the state.
In its decision, the Washington Supreme Court said it agreed with the couple’s assertion in a brief that “this case is no more about access to flowers than civil rights cases in the 1960s were about access to sandwiches.”
It added that public accommodation laws do more than guarantee access to goods and services.
“Instead, they serve a broader societal purpose: eradicating barriers to the equal treatment of all citizens in the commercial marketplace,” the justices wrote. “Were we to carve out a patchwork of exceptions for ostensibly justified discrimination, that purpose would be fatally undermined.” WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court said Monday it won’t weigh in on the case of a teenager convicted of rape and murder whose story was documented in the Netflix series “Making a Murderer.”
As is typical, the justices did not explain their decision declining to take the case. The justices’ decision leaves in place a lower court ruling against Brendan Dassey.
Dassey was 16 years old when he confessed to Wisconsin authorities that he had joined his uncle in raping and murdering photographer Teresa Halbach before burning her body in a bonfire. Dassey’s attorneys, however, say he’s borderline intellectually disabled and was manipulated by experienced police officers into accepting their story of how Halbach’s murder happened. They wanted his confession thrown out and a new trial.
Wisconsin officials had urged the Supreme Court not to take the case, telling the court it shouldn’t second-guess Wisconsin courts’ determination that Dassey’s confession was voluntary. Prosecutors noted that Dassey’s mother gave investigators permission to speak with him, that Dassey agreed as well and that during the interview investigators used only standard techniques such as adopting a sympathetic tone and encouraging honesty.
Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel said in a statement that his office was “pleased” with the Supreme Court’s decision not to take the case. “We hope the family and friends of Ms. Halbach can find comfort in knowing this ordeal has finally come to a close,” he said.
Dassey’s attorneys can still try to get him a new trial but they’d have to convince a judge that newly discovered evidence warrants one.
The Supreme Court’s decision comes as there are plans for a second season of “Making a Murderer,” which premiered on Netflix in 2015. Viewers of the first season were introduced to Dassey’s uncle, Steven Avery, who spent 18 years in prison for a rape before DNA testing exonerated him. After his release, he filed a multi-million dollar civil suit over his conviction, but in 2005 as that lawsuit was pending he was arrested for and later convicted of Halbach’s murder. Avery maintains he was framed.
‘(Public accommodation laws) serve a broader societal purpose: eradicating barriers to the equal treatment of all citizens in the commercial marketplace.’