Brenner v. Scott
Civil rights attorneys Bill Sheppard (Sheppard, White, Kachergus, & DeMaggio, PA) and Sam Jacobson (Bledsoe, Jacobson, Schmidt, Wright, & Wilkinson) filed Brenner v. Scott on behalf of a Leon County, Florida, same-sex couple seeking to have their Canadian marriage recognized by the state.
They complained of being unable to designate each other as a spouse in the state retirement benefits program because of Florida's non-recognition of and refusal to license same-sex marriages.
On April 21, 2014, Judge Hinkle ordered the Brenner and Grimsley cases consolidated for case-management purposes, though they remain separate on the docket.
On August 21, 2014, Judge Hinkle issued a ruling in Brenner and Grimsley that granted the same-sex couple plaintiffs' motion for a preliminary injunction.
He issued a temporary stay of his preliminary injunction, pending resolution of the three same-sex marriage cases that were then petitioning for a writ of certiorari before the U.S. Supreme Court, and for 91 days thereafter: Bostic v. Schaefer, Bishop v. Smith, and Kitchen v. Herbert.
In a separate part of his injunction, which he did not stay, he ordered the state to revise the death certificate of Carol Goldwasser to include the name of her wife, Arlene Goldberg, one of the plaintiffs.
[9] On October 7, 2014, following the U.S. Supreme Court's rejection the previous day of certiorari in Bostic, Bishop, and Kitchen, the Brenner and Grimsley plaintiffs filed separate motions asking Judge Hinkle to lift his stay before the 91-day period under the original order expired.
[14] Attorney General Pam Bondi based her request on the need to maintain statewide uniformity, noting Hinkle's injunction was directed to just one of Florida's sixty-seven clerks of court.
[17] On December 24, Judge Hinkle issued an order in which he noted that his injunction applied to the Secretary of the Department of Management Services, the Surgeon General, "and their officers, agents, servants, employees, and attorneys—and others in active concert or participation with any of them".
[21] An amicus brief filed by Florida Family Action said that the injunction as written applied to one clerk and that the district court lacked jurisdiction to modify it since the case had been appealed.
[24] Between the time of Judge Hinkle's decision and its implementation, clerks in thirteen counties–Baker, Calhoun, Clay, Duval, Franklin, Holmes, Jackson, Liberty, Okaloosa, Pasco, Santa Rosa, Wakulla, and Washington–announced they would issue such licenses but no longer provide courthouse wedding services to avoid having to officiate at the wedding of a same-sex couple.
Despite same-sex marriage being legal in Florida, as of February 2016 the case is still awaiting a final injunction order in the Northern District Court from Judge Hinkle.
