Nativity plaintiffs awarded legal fees

$52,358 granted in Baxter County

A federal judge on Friday awarded more than $52,000 to attorneys who successfully challenged the placement of a Nativity scene on the Baxter County Courthouse grounds last year.

U.S. District Judge Timothy L. Brooks awarded attorney fees totaling $49,855 and costs of $2,503.76, for a total of $52,358.76, to three attorneys representing the Washington-based American Humanist Association.

Court records show that the association asserted it was due more than $70,000.

It could not be determined Friday whether Baxter County will have to pay the fees and costs or whether the fees and costs would be covered by a liability fund or insurance plan. Efforts to reach County Judge Mickey Pendergrass and the county's attorney in the case, Jason Owens of Little Rock, were unsuccessful.

The humanist association and Mountain Home tattoo artist Dessa Blackthorn, who owns Tatooz by Sassy, filed suit against the county and Pendergrass in December 2014. The lawsuit charged that displaying the Nativity scene on the courthouse grounds violated the First Amendment prohibition against establishment of religion.

While allowing the Nativity scene on the courthouse grounds, Blackthorn and the association contended, Pendergrass denied in 2013 and 2014 requests by the humanist association to display a banner next to the Nativity scene that said "Happy Solstice."

Blackthorn said last year that at the same time the humanist association was requesting in 2014 to display the Happy Solstice banner, someone also had requested to display a Jewish menorah on the courthouse property.

Brooks ruled Nov. 12 in favor of Blackthorn and the humanist association. He ordered Baxter County to either bar religious displays on the courthouse property in Mountain Home or "create a public forum on the courthouse grounds for a seasonal display open to all faiths as well as of no faith at all, without discrimination on the basis of viewpoint."

Brooks also awarded $1 in damages to the association and Blackthorn.

Pendergrass announced in late November that the county no longer would allow a Nativity scene on the courthouse grounds and that the county would not appeal Brooks' ruling to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

"We will abide by the court's ruling," he read in a prepared statement. "I will not risk this county or its purse to assume any loss that would be ours if we went to an appeal on our own and lost."

State Desk on 02/06/2016

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