Lambda Legal Urges Appeals Court to Reverse Aberrant Lower Court Ruling and Strike Down Louisiana Marriage Ban

(New Orleans, La, -- October 17, 2014) – Lambda Legal today urged the U.S. 5^th Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse last month’s U.S. District Court ruling upholding Louisiana’s discriminatory marriage ban.

“The lower court got it wrong. It ignored Supreme Court precedent and stands alone against the avalanche of recent rulings that have concluded these discriminatory marriage bans violate the Constitution,” said Lambda Legal Senior Counsel Kenneth D. Upton, Jr. “As recently as last week, the Supreme Court declined to review appellate court victories for same-sex couples in seven marriage cases out of the 4^th, 7^th and 10^th Circuits striking down five bans similar to Louisiana’s. And, a day later, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down bans in Nevada and Idaho. In fact, there have been 46 decisions in federal and state courts in a little over a year holding that banning lesbian and gay couples from marrying violates the Constitution. One struggles to understand how this judge came to a different conclusion.”

Lambda Legal and Louisiana co-counsel filed today’s brief in Robicheaux v. Caldwell, the consolidated appeal of U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman’s combined decision in three lawsuits filed in the past year: Robicheaux v. Caldwell, Robicheaux v. George and Forum For Equality Louisiana, Inc. v. Barfield. Judge Feldman issued his ruling upholding Louisiana’s discriminatory ban in early September. Lambda Legal joined the legal team in early October.

In its brief, Lambda Legal argues that the lower court defied the holding of the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Windsor, which struck down the federal Defense of Marriage Act as violating both the equal protection and due process guarantees. Relying on dissents from Supreme Court and circuit court opinions, the court below got it wrong. In doing so, the lower court abdicated the federal judiciary’s essential role as guardian of all individuals’ constitutional rights, and licensed Louisiana to continue to perpetuate far-reaching harms inflicted on same-sex couples, and most especially their children, by the State’s discrimination against their families.

The plaintiffs in the combined appeal are:

Jonathan Robicheaux and Derek Penton of New Orleans, together since 2005 and married in Iowa in 2012; and Courtney and Nadine Blanchard of Lafourche Parish, married in Iowa in 2013 and raising a son together (represented by New Orleans attorney Richard G. Perque);

Robert Welles and Garth Beauregard of New Orleans, together for 24 years (represented by New Orleans attorney Scott J. Spivey of Landry & Spivey);

Forum for Equality Louisiana, the LGBT advocacy organization founded in 1989: Jacqueline and Lauren Brettner of New Orleans, together since 2011, married in New York in 2012 and the parents of a baby girl born in 2013; Henry Lambert and Carey Bond of New Orleans, together since 1974 and married in New York in 2011; Andrew Bond and Nicholas Van Sickels of New Orleans, together since 2003, married in the District of Columbia in 2013 and the parents of a daughter; and L. Havard Scott III and Sergio March Prieto of Shreveport, together since 1997 and married in Vermont in 2010 (represented by J. Dalton Courson, Lesli D. Harris, John Landis, Brooke Tigchelaar and Maurine Wall of the New Orleans firm Stone Pigman Walther Wittmann LLC).

Read and download the brief on our website: http://www.lambdalegal.org/in-court/legal-docs/robicheaux_la_20141017_robicheaux-appellants-brief

The legal team also includes, from Lambda Legal: Kenneth Upton, Susan Sommer, Camilla Taylor, Karen Loewy, Paul Castillo and Omar Gonzalez-Pagan, as co-counsel with.J. Dalton Courson and Lesli D. Harris and their team at Stone Pigman Walther Wittmann LLC; Scott J. Spivey of Landry & Spivey; and Richard G. Perque.