In January 2013, Laurel and Rachel Bowman-Cryer, who had been together 10 years and were foster parents to two girls, decided to get married. In planning for the wedding, Rachel went with her mother to a wedding cake tasting at Sweet Cakes by Melissa in the Portland suburb of Gresham, co-owned by Melissa and Aaron Klein. When Aaron learned that the wedding was for a lesbian couple, he said, “We don’t do same-sex weddings.” He then called the couple’s relationship an “abomination.”
The Bowman-Cryers filed complaints with the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries and Department of Justice. The Kleins responded by engaging in a very public defense of their discrimination, and the Bowman-Cryers as a result were inundated with hateful messages and death threats.
This is their story.
We're proud to be working with the Bowman-Cryer couple as amici along with their counsel from Kivel & Howard LLP.
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