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Judge rules former Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis must pay $260K in fees, costs

Former Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis has also been ordered to pay $100,000 in damages to the couple who sued her.
Ryland Barton
Former Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis has also been ordered to pay $100,000 in damages to the couple who sued her.

Former county clerk Kim Davis, who refused to issue marriage licenses in Rowan County, Kentucky, to same-sex couples, must pay a total of $260,104 in fees and expenses to attorneys who represented one couple, according to a federal judge's ruling.

The new payout is in addition to $100,000 in damages a jury said the former Rowan County clerk should pay the couple who sued.

Attorneys for Davis had argued that the fees and costs sought by the attorneys were excessive, but U.S. District Judge David L. Bunning disagreed and said Davis must pay since the men prevailed in their lawsuit, the Lexington Herald-Leader reported.

Attorneys for Davis were expected to appeal the ruling.

Davis drew international attention when she was briefly jailed in 2015 over her refusal, which she based on her belief that marriage should only be between a man and a woman.

Davis was released only after her staff issued the licenses on her behalf but removed her name from the form. Kentucky’s state legislature later enacted a law removing the names of all county clerks from state marriage licenses.