Court dismisses lawsuit against pastor blamed for Uganda's 'kill the gays' bill

A federal court has dismissed a lawsuit that an LGBT advocacy group filed against an American pastor who was accused of engaging in "crimes against humanity" for his campaign against homosexuality in Uganda.

In 2012, the Kampala-based advocacy group Sexual Minorities Uganda (SMUG) filed a lawsuit against Pastor Scott Lively, alleging that he has been waging a "decade-long campaign" to persecute gay people in the country

Lively, the president of Abiding Truth Ministries, has been accused of playing an "unparalleled role" in fomenting a "climate of hate" that brought about Uganda's anti-gay law, which briefly made homosexuality punishable by life imprisonment but was later struck down in the judiciary.

On Monday, Judge Michael Ponsor of the United States District Court of Massachusetts dismissed SMUG's lawsuit, arguing that Lively did not provide financial or material support to the campaign, and he did not encourage physical violence.

According to WWLP, early drafts of the 2014 anti-homosexuality act called for the death penalty for those convicted of "aggravated homosexuality" before it was reduced to life imprisonment. Ponsor noted in his referendum that Lively had suggested a twenty-year prison sentence, instead of the death penalty.

Liberty Counsel, a conservative legal group that represented Lively, argued that the case should have been dismissed back in 2013, based on a Supreme Court ruling that dealt with the Alien Tort Statute. The legal group noted that the ruling indicated that the statute was not intended to allow a foreign citizen to sue a U.S. citizen in America over violation of international law.

"Scores of pending cases around the country were dismissed following the 2013 Supreme Court ruling in Kiobel, but the one not dismissed was the SMUG case," the Liberty Counsel stated in a press release.

"Judge Ponsor has a long history of support for the LGBT agenda and said he considers judges 'the unappointed legislators of mankind.' Instead of dismissing the case in 2013, as it should have been, Ponsor opened the door for extensive and needless discovery," it continued.

Despite the dismissal of the case, SMUG's executive director, Frank Mugisha, considered the court's ruling as a victory because of the judge's statements that recognized the "dangers resulting from the hatred that Scott Lively and other extremist Christians from the U.S. have exported" to Uganda.

The pastor, on the other hand, thanked Posnor for "overcoming his clear ideological bias enough to acknowledge the legal deficiency of SMUG's case and bring it to a close."

Lively, who lost his bid for the governorship of Massachusetts in 2014, was the author of the book "The Pink Swastika," which alleges that homosexuals had an influence in Germany's Nazi Party.