Same-sex divorce case heads to top Maryland court

Jessica Port and Virginia Anne Cowan had settled on San Francisco as the place to turn their two-year engagement into a marriage, taking advantage of an opportunity in 2008 for same-sex couples to wed there.

They flew from their home in the District of Columbia, had a courthouse ceremony and played tourist in the city for a few days.

Two years later, the relationship in tatters, Port filed for divorce in Maryland, where she had bought a home. The women had already divided their belongings, didn’t hire lawyers, and they remained on terms so amicable that “we sat right next to each other at the divorce hearing,” Port recalled.

A year and a half after that, they’re still not divorced, adrift in legal limbo. A Prince George’s County judge refused their request for an uncontested divorce, and their case is wending its way through the courts.

For same-sex couples, calling it quits can be harder than saying “I do.”

While they are gaining the right to marry in an increasing number of states that have become magnetsfor same-sex nuptials, the couples are finding that divorce is often uncharted legal territory.

Read More : Baltimore Sun

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