Court dismisses appeal of former U.S. marine court-martialed for sticking Bible verses on her desk
An appeals court has dismissed the case of a former marine who was tried after sticking Bible verses on her desk and ruled that her former superiors did not breach her First Amendment rights.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces on Wednesday ruled 4-1 against Monifa Sterling, a former lance corporal at Camp Lejeune, N.C.
"We reject the argument that every interference with a religiously motivated act constitutes a substantial burden on the exercise of religion," said the court.
The military demoted Sterling and handed a bad-conduct discharge after a court-martial charged the former marine for disrespecting a superior officer, disobeying orders and failing to report for duty. Among other things, Sterling's superiors ordered her to remove the pieces of Bible verses she taped on her workspace, the incident which she later brought to court to cry foul on her exercise of religious freedom.
Sterling lifted the verses from Isiah 54:17 that says, "No weapon formed against thee shall prosper."
However, the judges decided that Sterling failed to address during a 45-minute oral argument four months ago whether she acted "based on a 'sincerely held religious belief' or motivated by animosity toward her chain of command."
The legal team representing Sterling on the case blasted the court's decision as "absolutely outrageous."
"A few judges decided they could strip a Marine of her constitutional rights just because they didn't think her beliefs were important enough to be protected," Kelly Shackelford, president of First Liberty Institute, told Fox News.
Judge Kevin Ohlson, who ruled in Sterling's favor, said that "while the military's asserted interest in good order and discipline surely deserves great deference, it does not demand reflexive devotion."
The Pentagon also launched an investigation that involved the alleged infringement of a military personnel's religious rights when military officials forcibly removed Air Force veteran Oscar Rodriguez, Jr., a decorated veteran, from a retirement ceremony in April because his flag-folding speech mentioned the word "God."