Nebraska judge denies divorce to same-sex couplebut rules on parenting plan, custody andchild support anyway

Bridge, Arbor Lodge, Nebraska City, home of Arbor Day

Dan Swanson of the Nebraska City News-Press reports that District Judge Randall Rehmeier denied a divorce Tuesday to a same-sex Nebraska City couple married in 2003 in Vermont because the Nebraska Constitution provides that “only marriage between a man and a woman shall be valid or recognized in Nebraska.”
     He said since the state does not recognize the marriage, he does not have jurisdiction to dissolve it.
     But he nevertheless granted custody of a four-year-old girl to the plaintiff, the girl’s biological mother, and ordered child support as well as weekend and holiday visitation.
     We at Aksarbent would love to see the look on homophobic Nebraska Atty. Gen. Jon Bruning's face when he hears this! Unless, of course, he isn't too preoccupied with his new effort (LB226) to stigmatize HIV positive people...

UPDATE: The blog of the National Organization for Marriage (NOM), the Mormon front group which peddles half-truths and outright lies about gay people, has picked up this story (ripping off the Nebraska City News-Press photograph without even a photo credit or a link) but, true to form, NOM deleted the part which makes the story most newsworthy: the fact that the judge ruled on child custody, visitation and child support even though he had to deny the couple a divorce because of Nebraska's draconian prohibition of same sex marriages, civil unions and domestic partnerships (constitutional amendment initiative 416, passed in 2000 in large part because of an LDS campaign fueled by hundreds of thousands of out-of-state dollars.)