SOCIAL ISSUES

 

Despite the fact California's law of consolidation would give the case to Quidachay, the city is trying "strategically" to move it to Warren, Staver said. San Francisco attorneys filed another action in Warren's court naming CCF as a defendant, arguing all the related legal matters should be transferred to Warren. But Staver believes the rules of consolidation and his group's "preemptory strike" filed yesterday make the chances of Warren hearing the case "slim to none." He said his client does not have to explain why it thinks Warren would prejudice its cause of action. The city attorney's office did not respond to WND's request for comment. On the front page of its website, the city attorney's office has a graphic of two women holding hands behind a banner that says"S.F. Leads the Fight for Marriage Equality."

'Not swayed'

In a short feature in the Oakland Tribune last week, lawyers who know Warren dismissed any notion his homosexuality plays much of a role in his judicial analyses. Warren's ruling in a high-profile dog mauling case last year involving a lesbian victim, Diane Whipple, was "especially galling" to the homosexual community, the paper said. The judge shocked the San Francisco courtroom by tossing out the jury's verdict finding Marjorie Knoller guilty of second-degree murder. That case indicates Warren is "not going to be swayed by public opinion," Knoller's appellate attorney Dylan Schaeffer told the Tribune. Nanci Clarence, a criminal defense attorney, said she expects Warren takes the same-sex marriage case "very, very seriously." "I don't think this will be the first time that he, as all judges must, has to sort through what his personal feelings are to come to a ruling," she told the Oakland paper. The Tribune story linked Warren with his grandfather, the architect of the U.S. Supreme Courts' civil rights rulings in the 1960s, stating he faces "the most pressing civil-rights issue of the day – whether the law allows same-sex marriages."