The first
individual lawsuit brought against the Kansas-based Westboro
Baptist Church, established by the notoriously antigay
preacher Fred Phelps, will commence in a civil
trial beginning next Monday in Maryland.
According to
The Baltimore Sun, Albert Snyder filed the
lawsuit in June 2006 after members of the church picketed
his son's funeral carrying signs with messages like
"Thank God for dead soldiers." Seven people -- three
adults and four children -- marched on public city
property outside Snyder's funeral March 10, 2006, at St.
John Roman Catholic Church in Westminster, Md., waving
placards expressing their belief that the military's
combat losses are a direct result of the United
States' tolerance for immoral behavior, including
homosexuality.
Westboro Baptist
-- which has about 75 members, the vast majority of whom
are Phelps's relatives -- protests at funerals using antigay
slurs without regard to the presumed sexual
orientation of the soldier, church members have said.
Synder's son,
Matthew, 20, had been in Iraq for one month when he was
killed in a March 2006 vehicle accident in Anbar province.
He served with the First Marine Expeditionary Force
based in Twentynine Palms, Calif.
Albert Snyder
filed the suit because he wanted to help stop the group
from staging any more demonstrations. The group famously
protested at Matthew Shepard's funeral with signs that
read "God Hates Fags." The church's protests have
prompted 22 states to enact or propose laws to limit
the rights of protesters at funerals.
At the trial, the
jury will be able to consider whether Westboro Baptist
Church is liable for an intentional infliction of emotional
distress based on the message from its members' signs,
U.S. district judge Richard D. Bennett told the
Sun. The judge also will allow jurors to decide
whether the Snyder family's expectation of privacy at
Matthew Snyder's funeral was violated by the church members'
protest outside St. John Church. (The
Advocate)
