Settlement reached in
a gay rights lawsuit
against a Rancho
Bernardo country club
By: NCTimes.com from
the Web, January 25, 2007
SAN DIEGO, Jan.24 -- A
settlement has been reached in a gay rights lawsuit against a Rancho Bernardo
country club that resulted in a landmark state Supreme Court ruling in 2005, it
was reported Wednesday.
The terms of the settlement reached earlier this month were not disclosed in
court documents. Attorney H. Paul Kondrick, who represented the lesbian
couple who sued the Bernardo Heights Country Club in 2001, said yesterday the
terms of the agreement are confidential, the North County Times reported.
The case had been scheduled to go to trial next month in the San Diego Superior
Court.
The couple, B. Birgit Koebke and Kendall French of Tierrasanta, alleged the
country club violated state law and discriminated against them because of their
sexual orientation and marital status.
The couple are registered domestic partners. Under state law, they cannot
marry.
A judge's pretrial ruling in favor of the country club prompted appeals that
ultimately reached the state Supreme Court in 2005. The high court ruled
in August of that year that businesses must offer registered domestic partners
in the state the same benefits offered to married couples.
The lawsuit had been scheduled for trial to decide a different issue left
unresolved in the Supreme Court's decision: whether the country club had
discriminated against Koebke and French by treating them differently than other
unmarried, heterosexual couples, the newspaper reported.
The Supreme Court said a trial on that issue should occur because Koebke and
French presented evidence suggesting that unmarried, heterosexual couples had
been given member benefits while Koebke and French were denied those benefits,
the Times reported.
|
