Oregon appeals court upholds $135,000 fine against anti-gay bakery
Denver, Colorado’s Masterpiece Cakeshop has received a lot of attention as the Supreme Court weighs whether the bakery should have legally been allowed to refuse to sell a wedding cake to a same-sex couple, but an Oregon bakery’s case is still underway. Last week, the Oregon Court of Appeals ruled that Sweetcakes by Melissa did, in fact, violate state law when it refused to serve a same-sex couple and upheld a $135,000 fine against the owners, Melissa and Aaron Klein.
The Sweetcakes case unfolded in early 2013, just a year after the Masterpiece Cakeshop refusal, but the details of the cases are nearly identical. Rachel and Laurel Bowman-Cryer sought a cake for their impending nuptials, and when owner Aaron Klein refused to sell them a wedding cake for their ceremony –before any discussion about the design of the cake could even take place — the couple filed a complaint with the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries (BOLI). In 2015, an administrative law judge recommended a fine of $135,000 for the Kleins in damages. A three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals unanimously ruled that the Kleins must pay the fine.
“Sweetcakes provides a service — making wedding cakes — to heterosexual couples who intend to wed, but it denies the service to same-sex couples who likewise intend to wed,” they wrote in their decision. There was no way to interpret that as anything but discrimination “on account of” the couple’s sexual orientation.
https://thinkprogress.org/oregon-baker-appeal-loss-32b4bfabbc77/
