Judge in North Carolina marriage case sets deadline for additional briefs

BREAKING UPDATE:

U.S. District Court Judge Max O. Cogburn, Jr., in Asheville issued a ruling Friday shortly after 5 p.m. EDT declaring the ban approved by state voters in 2012 unconstitutional. Details here →

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RALEIGH, N.C. — The judge overseeing a pair of challenges to North Carolina’s gay marriage ban has asked for more briefs in the case, setting a new deadline for early next week.

Chief U.S. District Court Judge William Osteen Jr. in Greensboro issued a Friday afternoon order asking for answers to a series of questions and setting a deadline of 3 p.m. Monday to receive responses.

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The delay was met with disappointment among scores of same-sex couples who had spent hours lined up at county courthouses across the state, awaiting a ruling allowing them to marry.

Osteen has appeared poised to strike down the marriage ban approved by North Carolina voters in 2012 since Wednesday, when he issued an order lifting his stays and dismissing all prior motions.

But Republican legislators filed motions Thursday seeking to intervene in the case after the state’s Democratic attorney general concluded that all possible legal defenses had been exhausted.