Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott has
intervened in a second gay divorce case, the Houston Chronicle
reported.
The state is already appealing Texas
District Judge Tena Callahan's 2009 ruling that allowed two Dallas
men married in Massachusetts in 2006 to divorce in the state. The
couple had been together for 11 years.
Abbott returned to court last week to
stop a lesbian couple who married in Massachusetts in 2004 from
divorcing.
Sabina Daly, 41, of San Antonio, and
Angelique Naylor, 39, of Austin were granted a divorce by Travis
County District Judge Scott Jenkins on February 10. Abbott filed a
motion to block the divorce the next day, but it was too late. The
state is now likely to appeal the ruling.
The attorney general is concerned that
the divorces force the state to recognize the existence of gay
marriage.
“A divorce is an ending or a
termination of a valid legal marriage,” Abbott told the paper. “In
this instance there was no valid legal marriage recognized by the
state of Texas. Texas can't have a faulty precedent on the books
that validates an illegal law.”
In her ruling last year, Judge Callahan
said the state's ban on gay marriage violates the U.S. Constitution.
The two women said they needed to
divorce to divide a home restoration and renovation business they
built together, as well as to establish parental rights for a
four-year-old adopted son.