Same-sex marriage case sent back to lower court
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- May
- 6
The state’s highest court Tuesday sent back to A lower court a case involving whether Monroe County has to recognize a marriage between two women.
The Court of Appeals refused to hear the case of Patricia Martinez, an employee of Monroe Community College, who sued the county after it refused to grant benefits to Martinez’s female partner, Lisa Ann Golden, whom she married in Canada in 2004.
The state Supreme Court ruled initially that they were not entitled to benefits, but that was overturned 5-0 by the mid-level Appellate Division of the state Supreme Court.
The county petitioned the Court of Appeals to hear the case. But the court ruled Tuesday that the issue of damages has to be settled before it can hear the case. That issue is now before the state Supreme Court in Rochester.
The county has argued that it didn’t have to provide benefits because the state doesn’t recognize same-sex marriages. Attorneys for the women countered that New York has long recognized marriages performed in other states and countries.
Massachusetts is currently the only state that allows same-sex marriages. Bills to make the practice legal are pending in the New York Legislature, but aren’t expected to pass this year.
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on Tuesday, May 6th, 2008 at 3:16 pm by Jay Gallagher.
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Jay Gallagher has covered Albany for Gannett News Service since 1984 and has been Albany Bureau chief since 1989. He`s a native of the Boston area and likes to point out that in this millennium, the score is Red Sox 1 championship, the Yankees 0. 
Cara Matthews has been a statehouse correspondent in the Albany Bureau since August 2005. Prior to that, she covered Putnam County government and politics at The Journal News for nearly five years. Before that, she worked at newspapers in Connecticut and covered the state Legislature for one of them. 
